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vtmAwr.firr. 


By  Gugtielmo  Ferrero 


The  Greatness  and  Decline  of  Rome 

In  Five  Volumes 

Vol.      I. — The  Empire  Builders 

Vol.     II. — Julius  Caesar 

Vol.   III. — The  Fall  of  an  Aristocracy 

Vol.  IV. — Rome  and  Egypt 

Vol.    V. — The  Republic  of  Augustus 

Characters  and  Events  in  Roman  History 

From  Ceesar  to  Nero  (60  B.C.-70  A.D.) 

Ancient  Rome  and  Modern  America 

A  Comparative  Study  of  Morals  and  Manners 

Between  the  Old  World  and  the  New 

A  Moral  and  Philosophical  Contrast 

A  Short  History  of  Rome 

In  Two  Volumes 

Problems  of  Peace  in  Europe 


Problems  of  Peace 

From   the   Holy   Alliance   to   the    League 

of    Nations.      A    Message     from     a 

European  Writer  to  Americans 


By 

Guglielmo   Ferrero 

Author   of    "A    Short   History    of    Rome,"    "The   Greatness 
and  Decline  of  Rome,"  etc. 


^55)1^ 


G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 

New  York  and  London 

n:be    H^ntcl^erbocker    press 

1919 


Copyright,  1919 

BY 

GUGLIELMO    FERRERO 


Ubc  *n(chcrboclier  fteee,  "Hew  )i}orh 


7)  A 

CONTENTS 


PAGE 


CHAPTER 

I. — To  THE  American  People  .         .         i 

II — Xhe    French    Revolution    and    the 

Austrian  Empire    ....         6 

XXI — The  League  and  the  Peace  of  the 

Dynasties  (1815-1848)     ...       29 

IV. — The  Revolution  of  1848  ...       65 

V. — The  Great  Surprise.     The  Germanic 

Triumph  (1848-1870)       .         .         .106 

T/T  —The   German   Peace   and   the   Ger- 

manizatton  OF  Europe  (1870-1914)    •     165 

VII. — From    the    Holy    Alliance    to    the 

League  of  Nations         .         .  •   240 


Ul 


Problems  of  Peace 


CHAPTER    I 

TO   THE   AMERICAN   PEOPLE 

"Will  they  come  or  will  they  not  ? ' '  That  was 
the  question  which  the  combatants  on  either  side 
put  to  each  other  as  they  looked  anxiously  towards 
the  West.  At  first  the  horizon  was  calm  and 
clear;  then  far  off  appeared  a  tiny  cloud  of  dust 
in  the  midst  of  which  there  could  just  be  descried 
a  flag  or  two,  and  here  and  there  the  glitter  of  a 
weapon.  But  the  cloud  broadened  and  ascended, 
tumultuous  with  men  and  coruscating  with  steel, 
and  then,  at  last,  there  issued  from  its  mighty 
depths,  friend  and  foe ;  those  who  exult  and  those 
who  tremble,  beheld  a  people  in  arms — an  inex- 
haustible flood,  a  final  reserve,  which  came  in 
time  to  decide  the  issue  of  the  mightiest  and 
bloodiest  conflict  ever  waged  by  mankind. 

To  us  it  seems  a  dream.    Can  the  prodigy  have 


2  Problems  of  Peace 

really  come  to  pass?     Can  it  really  be  that  the 
United  States  in  its  turn  precipitated  itself  into 
the  struggle  of  the  nations?     And  my  thoughts 
go  back  ten  years  to  the  long  conversations  I 
had  towards  the  end  of  1908  at  the  White  House 
with  Theodore  Roosevelt,  and  in  so  many  other 
hospitable  houses  in  Washington,   from  that  of 
Baron  Mayor  des  Planches  to  that  of  Elihu  Root, 
with  the  men  who  were  at  that  time  governing 
the   great   Republic,    to   other   conversations    in 
New  York,  Boston,  Philadelphia,  in  Pittsburg,  and 
in  distant   Chicago,  with  authors   and  bankers, 
merchants  and  professors,  journalists   and  minis- 
ters of  every  religion  and  creed.    How  often  in  the 
course  of  such  conversations  have  I  not  heard 
Americans  of  every^  position  and  status  express, 
each  in  his  own  way,  his  admiration  for  European 
culture,   for  its   schools,   its  art,   its   science,   its 
monuments,  and  its  history.     With  very  few  ex- 
ceptions, however,  Americans,  while  admiring  the 
greatness  of  Europe,  seemed  to  wdsh  to  keep  out  of 
our  wars  and  our  revolutions,  to  observe  these  in- 
deed, but  from  a  great  distance  by  means  of  pow- 
erful telescopes,  as  one  would  examine  a  cosmic 
catastrophe  on  another  planet.     Their  attitude, 
if  not  calmly  indifferent,  resembled  the  sad  serenity 
with   which  we  contemplate  the  cataclysms  of 


To  the  American  People  3 

Nature.  And,  as  every  passion  which  we  do  not 
feel  or  understand  seems  foolish  or  even  positively 
insane,  this  neutrality  of  \'iew  in  the  case  of  many 
Americans  verged  on  the  ironic  compassion  with 
which  we  smile  at  a  revolution  in  Cliina,  a  con- 
spiracy in  Turkey,  a  pronunciamento  in  South  Am- 
erica, or,  in  short,  at  any  convulsion  the  motives 
of  which  we  do  not  comprehend.  Therefore  I 
often  asked  myself  whether  America  could  ever 
acqtiire  the  melancholy  understanding  of  our  im- 
placable hatreds,  could  ever  grasp  the  meaning  of 
the  death  struggle  between  France  and  Germany, 
the  persecution  of  which  the  CathoHc  Church  has 
been  in  turn  the  author  and  the  victim,  the 
revolutionary  strivings  in  the  Russian  Empire 
which  resemble  the  sulphurous  emanations  and 
intermittent  rumblings  of  a  volcano  half  asleep, 
the  bitter  internal  discords  in  France  which  die 
down  only  to  revive  again,  or  the  hideous  death 
agonies  of  the  Hapsburgs. 

In  those  days  any  man  who  dared  to  predict  that 
nine  years  later  the  United  States  would  rush, 
sword  in  hand,  into  the  melee  of  European  antag- 
onisms, now  at  last  facing  each  other  in  a  mortal 
battle,  would  have  appeared  to  me  as  to  everyone 
else  to  be  a  visionar>^  And  yet  this  impossibility 
has  become  a  fact.     America  has  been  fighting 


•«^ 


4  Problems  of  Peace 

in  the  heart  of  Europe  with  all  her  strength,  for 
life  or  death.      America  placed  her  still  intact 
resoiirces  on  the  side  of  France,  England,  Italy, 
Belgium,  Serbia,  Portugal,  and  Montenegro,  all  of 
which  were  in  peril  after  the  collapse  of  Russia. 
The  issue,  we  may  safely  say,  was  one  on  which 
the  course  of  history  for  centuries  would  depend. 
That  is  why  a  European  who  has  already  had  so 
many  occasions  to  be  grateful  for  American  kind- 
ness and  courtesy,  who  has  had  the  good  fortvine  to 
mature  his  mind  in  America  for  the  understanding 
of  these  terrible  events,  begs  leave  to  recall  briefly 
to  Americans  the  whole  stormy  history,  which  has 
now  reached  its  climax,  from  its  beginnings  in  the 
French  Revolution,  rapidly  reviewing  it  as  it  grew 
decade  by  decade,  until  it  suddenly  precipitated 
itself  like  a  mighty  cataract  into  the  immeasurable 
maelstrom  of  the  present  crisis.    Rapidly  retracing 
its  course  from  its  beginnings  to  the  edge  of  the 
rapids,  we  shall  be  able  to  see  how  far  we  must 
go  back  to  find  a  landing-place  where  we  may  un- 
load from  the  imperilled  vessel  of  Western  Civili- 
zation the  most  precious  part  of  what  we  have 
inherited  from  our  forefathers  and,  while  we  aban- 
don the  battered  hull  to  the  torrent  and  the  abyss, 
decide  to  what  i^oint  below  the  fall  we  may  safely 
carry  what  remains  of  our  possessions  in  order  to 


To  the  American  People  5 

embark  them  on  a  quieter  and  more  friendly  stream. 
Only  if  we  know  how  this  tragedy  has  been  slowly 
maturing  for  more  than  a  century  shall  we — the 
men  of  the  old  and  the  new  worlds  now  united  in 
the  brotherhood  of  a  common  danger  and  a  com- 
mon duty — be  able  to  understand  what  we  must 
attempt  together  in  order  that  all  future  genera- 
tions may  be  spared  the  horrors  which  fate  has 
imposed  on  us. 


CHAPTER  II 

THE     FRENCH     REVOLUTION     AND     THE     AUSTRIAN 

EMPIRE 

The  question  whether  the  French  Revolution 
gave  Hberty  to  the  world  has  been  bitterly  debated 
for  more  than  a  hundred  years.  Some  say  it  did, 
others  that  it  did  not.  In  order  to  decide  the  point 
it  would  be  necessary  to  know  what  each  side 
means  by  liberty.  But  at  any  rate  there  is  no 
doubt  whatever  that  one  of  the  first  gifts  gener- 
ously bestowed  by  that  Revolution  on  the  peoples 
was  that  of  compulsory  military  service. 

This  point  is  of  such  capital  importance  that  we 
must  stop  to  consider  it  for  a  moment.  It  must  at 
once  be  admitted  that  any  military  system  must 
be  based  on  one  of  two  contrary  principles— the 
professional  principle,  whereby  war  is  regarded  as 
one  among  other  arts  practised  by  mankind,  a 
pursuit  voluntarily  chosen  as  a  means  of  livelihood 
by  any  one  who  feels  he  has  a  vocation  for  it,  or 
the  political  principle,  which  regards  the  bearing  of 
arms  as  a  civic  duty  incumbent  on  all  male  persons 

6 


The  French  Revolution  and  Austria      7 

whatever  their  profession,  their  social  position,  or 
their  education.  Each  of  these  principles  has  its 
good  and  its  bad  side.  The  professional  principle 
is  best  for  those  States  which  require  only  a  small 
army  but  which  must  have  it  of  the  best  quality, 
because  men  who  have  the  vocation  of  arms  are 
few.  The  political  principle,  on  the  other  hand,  is 
well  suited  to  States  which  need  a  larger  force  of 
less  high  quality  and  not  trained  above  the  aver- 
age. But  it  is  clear  that,  of  the  two,  the  profes- 
sional principle  is  the  more  in  conformity  with 
human  nature  and  military  science,  while  the  po- 
litical principle  is  not  and  cannot  be  more  than  a 
desperate  expedient  for  increasing  numbers.  There 
is  no  art  which,  if  it  is  to  be  thoroughly  known  and 
skilfully  exercised,  does  not  require  aptitude,  close 
study,  and  long  practice  and,  if  this  is  so,  how  can  it 
reasonably  be  argued  that  we  can  all  of  us  become 
improvised  warriors  in  a  few  months  ?  For  war  is 
one  of  the  most  difficult  of  all  arts,  requiring  as  it 
does,  not  only  much  knowledge  but  a  stem  appren- 
ticeship in  such  very  arduous  virtues  as  obedience, 
courage,  and  patience.  This  is  why  all  nations 
have  abhorred  conscription  as  the  most  detestable 
of  servitudes,  and  why  it  has  always  been  difficult 
to  induce  them  to  submit  to  it.  In  the  sixteenth 
and  seventeenth  centuries  war  was  the  chief  occu- 


8  Problems  of  Peace 

pation  of  the  Courts  of  Europe,  and  yet  none 
(though  all  were  absolute  monarchies)  had  the 
courage  or  the  power  to  impose  on  all  its  own  sub- 
jects the  obligation  to  serve  in  its  armies.  The 
soldiers  who  served  imder  their  banners  were  not 
all  volimteers,  and  they  did  not  scruple  to  enlist 
soldiers  by  force  when  they  could.  But  this  was 
the  exception,  not  the  rule,  and  the  men  taken  were 
of  the  humblest  class,  picked  up  here  and  there, 
over  a  long  period  of  time.  These  forced  soldiers 
in  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth  centuries  were 
not  citizens  fulfilling  a  civic  duty  equally  obliga- 
tory on  all,  but  men  compelled  by  their  own  excep- 
tional ill  luck  to  adopt  the  profession  of  arms.  In 
any  case,  if  volunteers  were  not  numerous  these 
impressed  soldiers  were  even  less  so ;  consequently, 
armies  were  small  and  the  wars  whereby  the  Courts 
strove  to  realize  their  territorial  ambitions  were 
Hmited  not  only  by  their  poverty  but  by  the 
difficulty,  not  a  small  one,  of  finding  soldiers. 

How  was  it  then  that  the  French  Revolution, 
which  was  to  free  the  world,  brought  with  it  this 
new  servitude  side  by  side  with  the  Declaration  of 
the  Rights  of  Man  ?  The  governments  of  Europe 
during  the  seventeenth  and  eighteenth  centuries 
were  at  the  same  time  both  strong  and  weak.  They 
were  strong  because  they  were  legitimate,  because 


The  French  Revolution  and  Austria      9 

they  possessed  a  title  to  authority  which  all  men 
recognized  as  genuine.     These  titles  varied  from 
State  to  State  and  were  sometimes  even  contra- 
dictory.    In  some  cases,  such  as,  for  example,  the 
Kingdom  of  Poland  and  many  small  Republics 
and  in  the  leading  case  of  the  Holy  Roman  Empire 
of  the  German  Nation,  the  title  was  given  by  elec- 
tion.   In  other  States  it  rested  on  hereditary  right, 
on  treaties,  or  on  the  complicated  principles  and 
elaborate  rules  of  feudal  law.    In  some  regions  the 
traveller  passed  under  a  new  sovereign  every  few 
miles  of  his  journey ;  sometimes  sovereignties  were 
enclosed,  one  within  another,  without  any  regard  to 
geography,  to  commercial  interest,  or  to  that  uni- 
formity and  equality  which  now  seem  to  us  to  be  a 
necessary  condition  of  order.    But  logical  or  illogi- 
cal, just  or  unjust,  decrepit  or  still  vigorous  and 
fresh,  all  these  sovereignties  appeared  legitimate, 
not  because  all  men  venerated  them  as  such  in 
their  hearts,  but  because  everybody  respected,  or 
said  they  respected,  them,  and  because  no  one 
dared  to  interfere.    All  being  supported  by  many 
interests,  all  maintained  themselves  intact  in  the 
respect  of  the  peoples,  precisely  because  there  were 
so  many  of  them,  and  because  there  was  none 
among  them  so  strong  as  to  be  able  to  overthrow 
and  destroy  all  the  rest.     But  these  governments. 


10  Problems  of  Peace 

so  strong  in  the  possession  of  their  authority,  were 
extremely  weak  in  exercising  it.  Instead  of  being 
gathered  up  in  a  feu'  vigorous,  well  co-ordinated 
and  subordinated  organs  of  government,  authority 
was  scattered  among  a  great  number  of  different 
centres,  ill  co-ordinated  and  subordinated,  each 
jealous  of  its  o^m  rights  and  privileges. 

Moreover  the  authority  of  the  State  was  not 
merely  scattered  through  a  multitude  of  organs, 
it  was  also  limited  in  every  direction  by  acquired 
privilege,  by  tradition,  by  local  autonomies  and 
customs,  and  therefore  it  was  forced  to  take  a  slow, 
difficult,  and  devious  way  among  all  these  obstacles 
and  impediments,  like  a  river  at  the  bottom  of  a 
narrow  gorge  twisted  and  obstructed  at  every  turn 
by  enormous  boulders.    Who,  for  instance,  would 
believe  that  in  1806,  when  Revolution  and  War 
had  ah-eady  half  uprooted  the  old  order  with  its 
pedantic  respect  for  legality,  in  the  night  of  Octo- 
ber Iith-I2th  on  the  eve  of  the  Battle  of  Jena, 
the  Prussian  army  encamped  in  the  woods  suffered 
severely  from  the  cold  because,  not  being  in  enemy 
territory,  it  had  not  the  right  to  requisition  even 
what  was  necessary  for  its  support ;  that  the  horses 
went  without  fodder,  though  there  were  ample 
siy^plies  in  Jena  afterwards  taken  by  the  French, 
because  Wolfgang  von  Goethe,  the  Grand  Ducal 


The  French  Revolution  and  Austria     ii 

Commissariat  Officer,  did  not  inform  the  generals 
in  time  that  they  had  his  permission  to  take  what 
was  necessary ! 

Throughout  the  eighteenth  centiu-}^  there  con- 
tinued to  exist  a  curious  monument  of  solemn 
and  venerated  impotence  in  the  shape  of  the  Holy 
Roman  Empire  of  the  German  Nation.  The 
diadem  which  the  electing  Princes  had  the  right  to 
bestow  on  the  object  of  their  choice  was  the  most 
august  emblem  of  authority  before  which  the  West 
could  bow,  for  it  was  believed  to  be  that  which 
had  been  worn  by  the  Roman  Emperors.  But, 
though  the  name  survived,  the  substance  of  the 
Empire  had  in  the  course  of  centuries  been  shat- 
tered into  a  cloud  of  small  and  even  tiny  States. 
How  many  were  the  families  and  ecclesiastical 
authorities  who  possessed  sovereign  rights  and 
powers  during  the  eighteenth  century  in  the  German 
Empire  with  the  titles  of  Duke,  Prince,  Count,  or 
Knight  of  the  Empire  ?  Nearly  fifteen  hundred,  of 
which  the  Knights  of  the  Empire  accounted  for  a 
thousand  by  themselves!  Now  these  families  and 
these  Prelates  not  only  possessed  sovereign  rights 
each  within  his  own  little  territory,  and  each 
different  from  the  rest,  which  the  Emperor  was 
obliged  to  respect.  All  but  the  Knights  had  also 
the  right  to  legislate,  in  some  cases  voting  singly,  in 


12  Problems  of  Peace 

others  collectively,  at  the  Diet  of  Ratisbon,  which 
was    composed    of    three    Chambers — Electors, 
Princes,  and  Imperial  Cities.    On  his  side,  the  Em- 
peror, who  for  three  centuries  had  always  been  a 
Hapsburg,  had  to  govern  his  own  States  in  addi- 
tion to  the  Empire.    Thus  there  was  a  Holy  Roman 
Empire  which,  as  it  were,  hired  the  sovereign  of 
another  State  to  be  its  Emperor,  which  shared  the 
capital,  Vienna,  of  this  State,  which  was  governed 
by  more  than  a  thousand  sovereigns,  each  having 
his  own  territory  and  his  own  laws,  and  a  number 
of  whom,  meeting  at  the  Diet  of  Ratisbon,  made 
laws  for  all  the  Empire,  thus  doubly  limiting  the 
power  of  the  Emperor.    It  may  easily  be  imagined 
how  rapid  and  how  vigorous  in  action  a  govern- 
ment so  constituted  was  likely  to  be.    Yet  it  was  so 
venerable  in  its  antiquity,  and  the  legitimacy  of 
so  many  authorities,  laws,  and  traditions  was  so 
indisputable  that  for  more  than  a  century,  from 
the  Thirty  Years'  War  till  the  Revolution,  it  had 
succeeded  in  protecting  a  great  number  of  helpless 
little  States  against  the  ambitions  of  Austria  and 
Prussia,  and  in  restraining  the  turbulent  nature 
of  the  German  peoples  by  the  invisible  network  of 
its  many  legalities,  which    were  so  pedantically 
observed. 

But  the  eighteenth  century  was  weary  of  obey- 


The  French  Revolution  and  Austria     13 

ing  these  governments  which  it  still  revered,  for 
they  were  weak,  incapable,  and  often  unjust  and 
oppressive,  not  because  they  were  tyrannous  in 
intention  but  because  they  were  impotent.  This 
is  the  contradiction  in  the  work  of  that  century, 
frivolous  and  tragic,  trifling  and  powerful,  little 
and  great,  which,  when  it  felt  that  old  age  was 
creeping  upon  it  determined  to  have  its  youth 
again  even  at  the  cost  of  selling  its  soul  to  the 
Devil.  More  than  two  hundred  years  previously, 
human  reason,  deserting  the  mediaeval  schools,  had 
ventured  forth  into  the  infinite,  seeking  truth  no 
longer  in  the  pages  of  a  few  books  but  in  the  affairs 
of  real  life.  The  art  of  war  had  been  reborn  in 
Europe  and  had  emerged  with  the  learning  of  the 
ancients  from  the  oblivion  of  the  Middle  Ages. 
The  principles  of  strategy  and  tactics  were  re- 
discovered in  Greek  and  Latin  books,  and  men 
worked  out  their  application  to  the  use  of  fire- 
arms then  recently  invented.  Among  the  greater 
and  lesser  European  dynasties  had  arisen  a  struggle 
to  aggrandize  themselves  either  by  force  of  aims 
or  by  treaties,  not  in  Europe  only  but  also  in  Asia 
and  Africa,  and  in  America,  the  newly  discovered 
continent.  The  wars  of  Religion  which  sprang 
from  the  Reformation,  had  supervened,  and  were 
often  mixed  up  with  wars  of  dynastic  predominance 


14  Problems  of  Peace 

and  colonial  conquest.     Thus  for  two  centuries 
what  we  now  call  militarism  had  been  making 
great  strides  in  Europe.    Diplomatic  skill,  valour 
"in  war,  success  in  negotiation  and  in  fighting,  were 
passports  to  the  favour  of  the  great  Territorial 
aggrandizements  and  were  valued  almost  in  propor- 
tion to  the  efforts  and  the  sacrifices  they  had  cost. 
But  armies  required  money,  and  war  not  money 
only  but  promptitude,  vigour,  and  elasticity  of  or- 
ganization in  the  belligerent  States.    Hence,  in  the 
eighteenth  century,  the  dispersion  of  authority, 
the  scrupulous  respect  for  vested  rights  and  for 
tradition  characteristic  of  the  old  regime  became 
specially  obnoxious  to  the  Courts  engaged  in  these 
wars  and  conflicts,  when  they  found  that  they 
were  thereby  weakened  and  embarrassed.     This 
was  the  cause  of  the  intellectual  ferment  and  the 
mania  for  action  and  for  novelty  which  agitated 
the  upper  classes  of  the  greater  European  States 
at  this  time,  driving  them  to  seek  sources  of  riches, 
beauty,  and  truth  which  had  hitherto  been  un- 
known.     In   France,   the  human   mind   made   a 
heroic  effort  to  remove  the  source  of  authority 
from  parchments,  from  historic  rights,  from  the 
inscrutable  depths   of   divinity,  into   the   sphere 
of  human  beings  who  were  recognized  as  having 
the  right  to  sit  in  judgment  on  governments  and 


The  French  Revolution  and  Austria     15 

therefore  to  accept  a  good  government  as  a  legiti- 
mate government.  Germany,  chained  to  the  earth 
by  the  institutions  of  the  Empire,  took  refuge 
in  a  paradise  of  the  imagination,  tried,  by  means 
of  romanticism  to  bring  about  a  revolution  in 
the  realm  of  beauty  by  overthrowing  classical 
models,  and  began  to  be  fevered  with  that  philo- 
sophic delirium  which,  growing  with  the  disorder 
of  the  times,  infected  the  whole  of  Europe  in  the 
ensuing  century.  England  emulated  the  mythical 
achievement  of  Prometheus  by  creating  docile, 
powerful,  and  unwearied  slaves  of  iron  animated 
by  fire,  by  whose  aid  she  might  conquer  the  riches 
of  the  world.  Every  now  and  then  Europe  was 
startled  by  some  portent  which  broke  the  ordinary 
course  of  human  history.  Now  it  was  Frederick 
the  Great  who  renewed  the  art  of  war;  now  Joseph 
the  Second  who  desired  to  reform  his  empire  from 
top  to  bottom;  now  the  first  partition  of  Poland. 
For  the  first  time,  three  States  came  to  an  agree- 
ment to  fall  upon  a  weaker  neighbour  for  no  other 
reason  than  that  they  coveted  her  fertile  lands, 
thus  cancelling  all  the  principles  of  international 
law  as  then  acknowledged  and  putting  in  their 
place  the  right  of  force.  There  was  immense  fear 
and  indignation  in  Europe  at  this  event,  but  no 
less  was  the  envy  of  all  the  States  who  might  have 


i6  Problems  of  Peace 

wished,  but  coiild  not  or  did  not  dare,  to  follow  this 
disastrous  precedent. 

The  elite  of  the  eighteenth  century  longed,  in 
a  word,  for  governments  stronger,  more  alert,  and 
more  intelligent    than    those   by   which   Europe 
was  then  ruled,  even  if  they  should  possess  fewer 
antique  parchment  credentials,  if  only  they  were 
ready  to  provide  capacity  and  energy  in  the  place 
of  the  legitimacy  which  seemed  to  have  no  life 
left  in  it.    For  this  reason,  encouraged  by  sover- 
eigns and  powerful  personages,  they  were  ready  to 
assail  the  existing  order,  or  at  least  such  parts  of 
that  order  as  seemed  most  out  of  date  and  most 
insensible  to  the  aspirations  of  the  day.    There  is, 
however,  nothing  on  earth,  which  is  at  the  same 
time  more  stable  and  more  fragile  than  a  legal 
principle.     It  will  resist  for  centuries  all  the  critic- 
isms of  reason,  all  the  protests  of  sentiment,  and 
all  the  assaults  of  opposed  interests,  only  to  fall 
in  a  few  weeks  when  overwhelmed  by  a  war  or  a 
revolution.    On  this  occasion  also,  the  earthquake 
of  the  Revolution  overthrew  in  a  few  years  what 
the  criticism  of  philosophers  and  the  reforms  of 
princes  had  barely  shaken.     After  hesitating  be- 
tween several  aims,  the  Revolution,  attacked  on  all 
sides  and  on  the  point  of  being  overwhelmed  by 
numbers,  had  recourse  to  the  political  principle  of 


The  French  Revolution  and  Austria     17 

military  service.  Owing  to  the  desperate  necessity 
of  finding  soldiers,  soldiers,  and  yet  more  soldiers, 
it  assembled  its  youthful  levies  under  officers  and 
non-commissioned  officers,  who  had  served  the  Mon- 
archy, inflamed  them  with  a  passion  of  patriot- 
ism and  revolutionary  ardour,  squandered  their 
blood  without  stinting,  unreservedly  adopted  the 
principle,  never  fully  accepted  by  the  eighteenth 
century,  that  war  annuls  all  rights  which  are  in 
force  in  time  of  peace,  and  conquered  a  Europe 
which  depended  on  little  armies  recruited  on  the 
professional  principle. 

But  for  success  in  war,  valorous  and  well-led 
armies  are  not  enough.  Resolute  and  energetic 
governments  are  also  necessary;  and  so  the  Re- 
volution had  to  set  about  creating  in  France  a 
powerful  State,  based  on  the  ruins  of  the  ancient 
principles  of  legitimacy  and  its  own  dreams  of 
happiness  and  freedom.  The  Church  and  the 
Nobility,  the  two  powers  which  under  the  ancien 
regime  had  overpowered  the  Monarchy  they  pre- 
tended to  serve,  were  humiliated.  Authority  was 
concentrated  in  the  State  which  received  well- 
defined  powers  and  was  administered  by  a  capable 
staff  recniited  according  to  merit.  Wide  roads  of 
common  law  convenient  to  all  were  driven  through 
the  tangled  thickets  of  privilege  and  vested  rights 


1 8  Problems  of  Peace 

which  had  burdened  so  much  of  the  old  France. 
The  medley  of  the  ancient  laws  was  codified 
and  made  simple.  In  short,  there  was  impro- 
vised a  simpler  and  stronger  government,  more 
efficient,  and  more  in  harmony  with  the  dic- 
tates of  reason,  which  plunged  boldly  ^dth 
fresh  forces  into  the  struggle  for  territorial 
expansion,  making  a  free  and  ever  m^ore  auda- 
cious use  of  the  sovereign  right  of  force  which, 
to  the  great  scandal  of  all  Europe,  Russia,  Prus- 
sia, and  Austria  had,  for  the  first  time,  applied 

to  Poland. 

The  Revolution  did  not,  however,  succeed  in  find- 
ing or  applying  any  new  principle  of  legitimacy. 
For  a  time,  some  attempt  was  made  to  rediscover 
the  mystic  source  of  lawful  authority  in  the  will  of 
the  people;  but  as  no  one  knew  exactly  where  this 
will  was  to  be  found  or  how  it  was  to  be  expressed 
or  recognized,  it  was  finally  confounded  and  identi- 
fied with  the  genius,  the  energy,  the  fortunes,  and 
the  victories  of  a  single  man.    The  Republic  was, 
practically  without  intermission,  governed  by  a 
dictatorship  until  an  ex-captain  of  artillery,  born 
of  a  needy  family  of  the  minor  nobility  of  Corsica, 
ascended  the  throne  of  France  because  he  had 
proved  that  he  knew  how  to  rule  and  make  war, 
and  became  the  first  champion  of  the  new  Divine 


The  French  Revolution  and  Austria     19 

Right  of  intelligence  which  was  apparently  impos- 
ing itself  upon  Europe. 

Thus  the  French  Revolution  became  at  once  the 
terror  and  the  model  of  European  monarchies,  by 
which  it  was  the  more  hated  the  more  they  were 
obliged  to  learn  from  it.  Among  all  the  rest,  the 
two  great  Germanic  monarchies,  Austria  and 
Prussia,  were  its  best  scholars  and  its  most 
implacable  enemies.  This  contradiction  contains 
one  of  the  two  most  profound  and  terrible  secrets 
of  the  history  of  Europe  in  the  nineteenth  century. 
Taught  by  their  imitation  and  by  their  defeats, 
Austria  and  Prussia  sought  to  strengthen  them- 
selves as  France  had  done  by  taking  advantage  of 
the  upheaval  ¥/hich  had  weakened  in  every  mind 
the  sentiments  of  legality  and  tradition,  and  the 
respect  for  treaties  and  for  the  estabhshed  order. 
In  1793  and  1795,  while  at  war  with  France,  Aus- 
tria and  Prussia,  profiting  by  the  difficulties  with 
which  their  adversary  was  struggling,  agreed  with 
Russia  to  seize  the  Polish  territories  which  had 
escaped  the  first  partition.  Austria  began  to 
introduce  conscription,  though  to  a  less  degree 
than  in  France,  and,  in  1797,  under  the  Treaty  of 
Campo  Formio,  she  came  to  an  understanding 
with  the  French  Republic  to  which  she  surren- 
dered Belgium,  Lombardy,  and  the  eastern  bank  of 


20  Problems  of  Peace 

the  Rhine,  receiving  in  exchange  the  territories  of 
the  Venetian  Republic.     The  young  Republic,  the 
daughter  of  the  Revolution,  and  the  Holy  Roman 
Empire  agreed  to  tear  up  parchments  and  scraps 
of  paper  in  order  to  aggrandize  themselves  at  the 
expense  of  old  and  legitimate  governments,  among 
which  was  no  other  than  the  Republic  of  Venice, 
the  most   brilliant   jewel   among   Mediaeval   and 
Renaissance  States,   a  miracle  of  well-preserved 
beauty.     Henceforth,  no  legitimate  government 
which  could  not  defend  itself  was  recognized  as 
possessing  any  rights  at  all.    As  Napoleon  said  to 
Martens,  International  Law  was  the  same  thing  as 
the  law  of  the  stronger.      Ambition  and  suspicion 
were  now  sufficient  motives  for  war;  the  inter- 
national order  ceased  to  be  stable,  and,  as  no  State 
was  safe,  all  had  to  arm  themselves.    There  was 
terror  at  the  French  victories  and  at  the  ever  im- 
minent danger  of  war.     An  even  greater  terror  of 
the  catastrophe  which  had  destroyed  the  French 
nobility  and  the  Monarchy  was  inspired  in  Austria, 
Prussia,  and  the  lesser  German  States,  where  the 
aristocracy,  the  clergy,  the  army,  and  the  official 
class  rallied  to  the  support  of  legitimate  monarchy 
against  the  upstart  power  of  France  and  the  dragon 
of  Revolution.     They  made  a  willing  sacrifice  of 
vested  right,  tradition,  and  all  privileges  which 


The  French  Revolution  and  Austria    21 

limited  or  hindered,  even  to  their  advantage,  the 
authority  of  the  King.  At  Vienna,  centralized 
absolutism,  which  had  been  fighting  tenaciously 
for  two  hundred  years  against  the  spirit  of  au- 
tonomy, rapidly  prevailed.  Resistance  weakened; 
the  provincial  Diets  gave  up  contending  for  their 
constitutional  rights.  Germany  began  to  awaken 
from  her  long  sleep,  her  philosophic  delirium  in- 
creased as  the  old  world  fell  to  pieces  around  her; 
behind  Kant  stood  Fichte  and  Schelling.  Even 
the  lesser  Princes  felt  and  admitted  that  the  day 
was  at  hand  when  they  would  have  to  be  merged 
and  disappear  in  a  higher  and  more  powerful  unity. 
In  all  the  monarchical  States,  the  authority  of  the 
Court  increased  because  the  Court,  following  the 
example  set  in  France,  now  watched  over  and 
directed  everything.  But  the  more  the  legitimate 
monarchies,  as  their  power  grew,  imitated  Napoleon, 
the  more  they  hated  the  usiuper  and  the  more  they 
longed  to  overthrow  him.  Hence  one  war  sprang 
from  another  in  a  concatenation  which  seemed  as  if 
it  would  never  end,  and,  with  each  new  war,  there 
crumbled  away  some  new  part  of  the  ancient  order 
under  which  Europe  had  lived.  In  1801,  the 
Treaty  of  Luneville  surrendered  the  whole  of  the 
left  bank  of  the  Rhine  to  the  French  Republic. 
In  the  following  year  the  stronger  States  of  Ger- 


22  Problems  of  Peace 

many— Prussia  and  Austria  among  them— com- 
pensated themselves  for  this  loss  by  agreeing  to 
the  immediate  annexation  of  a  great  number  of 
the  smaller  States,  for  the  most  part  Free  Cities 
and  eccl esiastical  Principalities.    In  1 804,  while  the 
war  against  France  and  the  Third  Coalition  were 
being  prepared,  Napoleon  crowned  himself  Em- 
peror, and  Francis  I.  at  once  followed  suit  by  pro- 
claiming himself  Emperor  of  Austria  "with  all  due 
regard  to  the  independent  States."    This  double 
status  did  not  last  long,  for  in  1806,  after  the  Battle 
of  Austerlitz,  the  discomfiture  of  the  Third  Coali- 
tion, and  the  Peace  of  Presburg,  Napoleon  united 
Western  and  Southern  Germany,  including  Bava- 
ria, in  the  Confederation  of  the  Rhine  which  was 
placed  under  his  protection,  and,  on  August  6th, 
Francis  I.  declared  that  the  Holy  Roman  Empire 
of  the  German  Nation  was  dissolved.    Destiny  was 
fulfilled.    Henceforth  the  German  people  was  freed 
from  the  system  of  little  Kingdoms,  respected  but 
impotent,  under  which  it  had  become  feeble.    The 
little  German  principalitior.  which  had  escaped  from 
the  ruin  of  1802  were  now  incorporated  in  a  few 
more  powerful  States.     Germany  had  taken  an- 
other step   towards  her   unification,  and  in  her 
midst  there  arose  the  new  Empire  of  Austria,  imi- 
tating but  hating  the  French  Empire. 


The  French  Revolution  and  Austria    23 

It  is  very  frequently  said  that  the  Empire  of 
Austria  is  a  relic  of  the  Middle  Ages,  a  feudal 
State,  and  a  living  anachronism.  This  is  only 
partly  true.  The  Austrian  Empire  would  be 
younger  by  a  few  months  than  the  Empire  of  the 
Napoleonidae,  if  the  latter  had  not  been  shattered 
by  Fate  in  its  earliest  years.  She  also  is  a  daugh- 
ter, albeit  a  bastard  daughter,  of  the  French 
Revolution,  one  of  the  States  which,  like  Prussia, 
profited  by  the  ideas,  the  innovations,  and  the 
institutions  that  the  Revolution  and  the  Empire 
created  or  experimented  with,  not  in  order  to  alter 
the  principles  of  government  or  to  liberate  the 
world,  but  to  aggrandize  themselves,  to  increase 
their  military  power,  and  to  free  themselves  from 
many  of  the  impediments  from  which,  under  the 
ancient  regime,  owing  to  the  dispersion  and  the 
limitation  of  its  authority,  the  State  suffered. 

After  her  defeat  at  Jena,  Prussia  followed  this 
path  even  more  ardently  than  Austria.  The  State 
was  modernized  by  the  addition  of  all  the  institu- 
tions and  all  the  principles  of  the  Revolution  which 
could  reinforce  the  authority  of  the  monarch,  the 
government,  and  the  nobility.  The  principle  of 
compulsory  military  service  for  all  citizens  was 
definitely  adopted,  and  applied  more  resolutely 
and  coherently  than  in  all  other  countries,  not 


24  Problems  of  Peace 

excepting  France.  But  the  sole  object  was  to  be 
able  to  fight  with  better  fortune  the  hated  mast^ 
who  had  taught  them  how  to  become  strong  at  the 
expense  of  their  own  principles  of  legitimacy.  The 
fact  is  that  these  ancient  States  were  afraid  of 
being  rejuvenated  by  dealing  with  the  Devil,  whc 
had  taken  the  form  of  the  Revolution,  and  their 
fears  were  not  without  foundation,  for  how  can  an 
established  order  of  things  be  founded  on  the  mere 
prestige  of  force,  which  is  the  most  tmstable  of  all 
elements  in  human  life  ? 

Even  Napoleon  tried  to  legitimatize  his  au- 
thority by  means  of  ancient  parchments  which  had 
escaped  the  furnace  of  the  Revolution.  He  caused 
himself  to  be  crowned,  and  insisted  at  all  costs 
on  allying  himself  with  the  ancient  dynasties  of 
Europe.  How  should  these  ancient  dynasties  not 
have  been  terrified  by  the  danger  with  which  ideas 
and  events  in  France  threatened  their  immemorial 
authority  even  in  the  very  hour  of  the  increase  of 
their  strength  ?  And  how  was  the  prestige  of  the 
old  crowns  to  be  restored ;  how  were  they  to  recover 
their  old  symbolic  lustre  before  they  had  destroyed 
this  false  crown  that  a  soldier  of  genius  had  made 
with  his  own  hands  before  their  very  eyes  and 
which  in  the  eyes  of  so  many  shone  with  a  glory 
greater  than  their  own  ? 


The  French  Revolution  and  Austria    25 

Hence  there  flared  up  in  Europe  a  war  which 
became  more  bitter  every  year,  and  which,  like 
our  present  war,  seemed  as  if  it  would  never  end. 
When  it  died  away  in  one  country  it  was  rekindled 
in  another,  because  there  could  be  no  confidence 
and  therefore  no  solid  agreement  but  merely  a 
truce  between  the  old  dynasties  and  aristocracies 
of  Europe  and  the  new  order  of  things  as  consti- 
tuted in  France. 

In  the  midst  of  these  wars,  amid  the  clash  of 
arms,  the  German  tribes  at  last  reawakened  and 
took  part  in  the  great  struggle — no  longer  with 
their  pens,  their  dreams,  and  their  philosophies, 
but  by  hurling  themselves  into  the  final  duel 
between  Europe  and  the  French  Empire.  In  the 
end,  aided  by  England  and  the  mistakes  of  the 
enemy,  the  ancient  dynasties  of  Europe  vanquished 
their  model  and  the  French  Empire  fell.  But  the 
victors  understood  that,  having  squandered  the 
blood  of  the  peoples  in  order  to'  overthrow  Napo- 
leon, they  would  have  to  give  peace  and  order  to 
their  subjects,  who  were  exhausted  by  the  inter- 
minable war,  if  they  were  to  re-establish  their 
own  authority.  They  knew  that  they  could  not 
do  this  or  maintain  peace  by  force  alone,  without 
recourse  to  some  of  the  principles  of  legitimacy 
which  had  been  confused  and  ruined  not  only  by 


26  Problems  of  Peace 

the  Revolution  but  also  by  some  of  the  counter- 
revolutionaries. The  fall  of  Napoleon  had  shown 
the  world  how  weak  were  the  governments 
created  by  the  Revolution  and  the  Empire.  They 
were  vigorous  and  enterprising,  but  they  were  the 
children  of  their  own  efforts  and  lacked  all  historic 
title,  and  all  of  them,  including  the  Kingdom  of 
Italy,  fell  before  the  first  breath  of  misfortune. 

In  Italy,  the  people  had  reproached  its  strong 
and  laborious  government  with  the  very  benefits 
it  conferred  as  if  these  had  been  crimes.  Order, 
public  works,  the  increase  of  industry  and  agricul- 
ture, became  odious  by  reason  of  the  burdens  by 
which  these  benefits  had  to  be  paid — ^levies,  taxes, 
and  a  strict  administration.  The  Minister  Prina 
was  assassinated,  and  in  him  perished  the  precurs- 
or of  the  line  of  vigorous  and  intelligent  adminis- 
trators who,  half  a  century  later,  were  to  organize 
the  new  Kingdom  of  Italy.  The  government, 
whose  sole  title  was  that  it  was  more  efficient  than 
its  predecessors,  was  overturned.  It  is  the  eternal 
inconstancy  of  peoples  that  when  they  have  a 
weak  government  they  sigh  for  the  severe  dis- 
cipline of  force,  and,  when  they  have  to  obey  in 
earnest,  they  look  back  with  longing  to  the  slack 
control  of  decrepit  rulers. 

But  what  was  to  be  the  new  principle  of  au- 


The  French  Revolution  and  Austria     27 

thority?  The  Wars  of  the  Revolution  and  the 
Empire  had  reinforced  in  the  Great  States  of 
Europe  the  power  and  the  prestige  of  Courts,  and 
the  victors  beheved  that  they  had  found  what  was 
required  in  the  Divine  Right  of  the  historic  dynas- 
ties, in  which  they  acclaimed  not  one  principle  but 
THE  sole  and  single  principle  par  excellence  of  all 
legitimacy.  Metternich  defined  it  in  his  cele- 
brated dictum — ' '  Only  sovereigns  have  the  right  to 
direct  the  fate  of  peoples  and  for  their  veto  they 
are  responsible  only  to  God. "  The  old  crowns  and 
sceptres  were  drawn  from  the  repositories  in  which 
they  had  been  timorously  hidden  M'-hen  the  Re- 
volution had  brutally  throv/n  into  the  gutter  the 
sceptre  and  the  crown  of  the  most  ancient  dynasty 
in  Europe.  They  were  dusted  and  polished  so  as 
to  restore  as  far  as  might  be  their  former  splendour. 
The  people  were  directed  once  more  to  bow  before 
these  ancient  emblems  of  authority  and  these 
alone,  and  the  victors,  as  if  they  were  carrying  out 
a  duty  laid  upon  them  by  God,  proceeded  to 
divide  the  rich  booty  which,  when  France  had 
been  driven  back  to  the  frontiers  of  1789,  com- 
prised the  Belgian,  Dutch,  Swiss,  and  German 
Departments;  the  Kingdom  of  Italy;  the  Duchies 
of  Lucca  and  Piombino;  the  Illyrian  provinces; 
Saxony,  Westphalia,  and  the  territories  of  the  Con- 


28  Problems  of  Peace 

federation;  the  Duchy  of  Warsaw — in  all,  thirty- 
two  million  souls,  whom  the  powers  divided  among 
themselves  like  a  herd  of  cattle.  The  Austrian 
Empire  received  Lombardy,  Venetia,  the  Illyrian 
provinces,  and  the  Presidency  of  the  Germanic 
Confederation.  Piedmont  and  Sardinia  were  re- 
stored to  their  former  sovereigns  with  the  addi- 
tion of  the  territory  of  the  ancient  Republic  of 
Genoa.  The  Bourbons  resumed  possession  of 
the  Kingdom  of  Naples  and  the  Pope  that  of  the 
States  of  the  Church.  Belgium  and  Holland  were 
reunited  and  assigned  to  the  House  of  Orange. 
The  territories  on  the  left  bank  of  the  Rhine  were 
divided  between  Prussia  and  Bavaria.  Prussia 
received  in  addition  a  portion  of  Saxony,  Russia 
the  greater  part  of  the  Duchy  of  Warsaw.  The 
King  of  Prussia  and  the  Emperors  of  Russia  and 
Austria  thereupon  concluded  among  themselves 
the  compact  known  as  the  Holy  Alliance. 


CHAPTER  III 

THE    LEAGUE   AND   THE    PEACE   OF  THE  DYNASTIES 

1815-1848 

By  concluding  and  accepting  the  compact  of  the 
Holy  AlHance,  the  monarchies  of  Europe  renounced 
the  policy  of  continuous  war  whereby  they  had 
tried  to  aggrandize  themselves  during  the  seven- 
teenth and  eighteenth  centuries.  They  sheathed 
their  swords;  they  took  an  olive  branch  in  their 
hands  and  pledged  themselves  to  make  war  no 
more,  to  secure  for  their  peoples  the  supreme 
benefit  of  a  lasting  peace,  and  to  live  as  one  great 
and  imited  family.  To  an  immense  war,  which 
had  often  seemed  as  if  it  could  have  no  end,  there 
succeeded  a  universal  repentance  whereby  were 
chained  up  all  the  passions  generated  by  warfare. 
From  18 1 5  until  1848  the  Courts  of  Europe  were 
able  to  restrain  their  rivalries,  their  cupidities,  and 
their  ambitions  sufficiently  to  prevent  a  breach  of 
the  peace.  Their  armies  vegetated  and  slumbered, 
and  military  expenditure  did  not  increase.     The 


30  Problems  of  Peace 

Holy  Alliance,  therefore,  was  the  first  essay  at 
a  league  of  European  States  attempted  by  the 
monarchies  in  order  to  maintain  peace  throughout 
the  Continent.  It  was,  however,  a  painful  effort, 
imperfect  in  itself  and  destined,  after  thirty-three 
years,  to  a  resounding  collapse  for  reasons  which 
I  will  now  try  to  explain. 

The  Revolution  and  the  Empire  had  created  in 
the  Valley  of  the  Po  a  national  State  which  might 
have  lived  and  grown.  If  the  Congress  of  Vienna, 
while  changing  the  dynasty,  had  respected  the 
Kingdom  of  Italy  and  had  completed  the  work  left 
half  done  by  France  by  unifying  the  Valley  of  the 
Po  from  the  Alps  to  the  Adriatic,  Italy,  under  the 
predominant  authority  of  this  national  State, 
might  have  moved  resolutely  with  the  times, 
might  have  federated,  unified,  industrialized  her- 
self and  modernized  her  institutions,  manners,  and 
doctrines  by  her  own  strength  without  setting 
three  great  Powers  at  variance,  and,  perhaps,  with- 
out engaging  in  a  fierce  struggle  with  the  Papacy. 
But  the  Fates  ordained  otherwise.  Piedmont 
having  been  restored  to  the  old  dynasty,  and 
Lombardy  and  Venetia  assigned  to  the  Hapsburgs, 
the  new  Austrian  Empire  dominated  the  whole 
peninsula  from  the  Valley  of  the  Po  and  held  the 
hegemony  of  Italy  because  even  the  strongest  of 


The  League  of  the  Dynasties       31 

the  Italian  States,  the  Kingdoms  of  Sardinia  and 
of  the  two  Sicilies,  were  pigmies  in  comparison 
with  the  Austrian  dominion,  irrespective  of  the 
Duchies  of  Parma,  Modena,  and  Tuscany,  and  the 
States  of  the  Church.  Now,  if  the  Governments 
set  up  by  Napoleon  in  the  Valley  of  the  Po  lacked 
legitimate  titles,  the  Empire  of  Austria  was  no 
better  provided,  the  Congress  of  Vienna  having 
audaciously  usurped  the  function  of  Chancellor 
of  the  Most  High  for  the  political  affairs  of  this 
imperfect  worid.  The  difficulty,  moreover,  was 
not  confined  to  the  policy  for  Italy  but  was  com- 
mon in  a  greater  or  less  degree  to  all  the  States, 
old  and  new,  of  the  so-caUed  Restoration.  The 
Divine  Right  of  dynasties  was  a  principle  of  the 
old  legitimacy;  but  in  the  previous  centuries  it 
had  not  been  the  only  one,  for  there  were  others, 
such  as  election,  representation,  heredity,  treaties, 
tradition,  etc.,  which  were  interlaced  in  the  solid 
structures  of  political  and  social  order.  Even 
in  the  pre-revolutionary  States  of  the  House  of 
Austria,  Bohemia  and  Hungary  had  regarded 
themselves  as  elective  monarchies.  When  all  the 
principles  of  legitimacy  were  reduced  to  that  of 
the  new  Divine  Right  of  d)masties,  all  Europe  and 
many  of  the  States  of  Austria  went  back  from  the 
eighteenth  to  the  fourth  century,  to  the  absolutism 


32  Problems  of  Peace 

of  Diocletian  and  Constantine — a  leap  baclcwards 
which  was  too  sudden  and  violent  for  the  century 
that  had  seen  the  fabulous  adventure  of  the  Re- 
volution.    Moreover  the  Austrian  Empire,  which 
washed  to  see  all  the  peoples  of  Europe  on  their 
knees  before  the  thrones  of  the  restored  sovereigns, 
forgot  that  it  had  taken  advantage  of  the  wars  of 
the  Revolution  to  steal  the  territories  of  others, 
and  for  the  benefit  of  its  own  dynasty  to  dispossess 
legitimate  governments.    The  Empire  forgot  that 
the  new  legitimacy  had  been  improvised  to  cover 
the  violence  which  it  had  used  to  so  many  legiti- 
mate governments  within  and  without  its  borders. 
Why  should  the  Bohemians  and  the  Hungarians 
suddenly   acquire  the  conviction   that   God  had 
created  them  to  obey  the  Hapsburgs  when  they 
had  always   believed  that  they  had  voluntarily 
placed  themselves  under  the  rule  of  that  family? 
Why  should  the  minor  states  of  Italy  recognize 
the  divine  mission    of  the  Austrian   Empire   to 
protect  and  rule  them,  and  why  should  the  Vene- 
tians revere  the  Austrian  Emperor  and  the  Geno- 
ese the   King  of   Sardinia   as  sovereigns  sent  to 
them  from  on  high  ?    The  legitimate  Governments 
of  Venice  and  of  Genoa  should   of  course  have 
been  the  ancient  Republics  now  buried  under  the 
debris  of  the  revolutionary  earthquake.    Similarly, 


The  League  of  the  Dynasties       33 

if  part  of  France  recognized  in  Louis  XVIII .  a 
legitimate  sovereign  who  had  reascended  the  throne 
of  his  ancestors,  the  other  part  which  believed 
in  the  Revolution  and  had  prostrated  itself  be- 
fore the  domination  of  Napoleon,  despised  and 
hated  the  King  as  a  usurper  imposed  upon  them 
by  foreign  armies.  The  same  disillusion  awaited 
the  King  of  Sardinia,  the  King  of  the  two  Sicilies, 
and  the  Pope ;  for,  while  one  section  of  the  popula- 
tion joyfully  w^elcomed  these  rulers  as  legitimate 
sovereigns,  another,  though  no  doubt  a  minority, 
shut  themselves  up  in  their  houses  and  cursed  the 
return  of  the  restored. 

The  Restoration  in  fact  was  the  counterpart  of 
the  Revolution,  even  in  the  fact  that  its  sole 
authentic  title  to  authority  was  force.  The 
Congress  of  Vienna  had  carried  out  its  grotesque 
restoration  of  Europe,  not  because  it  had  received 
a  mystic  mandate  from  heaven,  but  because  the 
Allies  had  beaten  Napoleon  ini8i4andini8i5, 
and  had  forced  him  to  abdicate.  This  time,  how- 
ever, the  right  of  force,  which  drew  its  strength 
from  Napoleon's  ruin,  tried  to  surround  itself 
with  a  veil  of  divine  mystery — an  adroit  subter- 
fuge invented  by  that  veteran  of  the  Chancelleries, 
Talleyrand.  It  might  have  succeeded  if  the  cloud 
had  still  glittered  in  the  full  splendour  of  day. 


34  Problems  of  Peace 

dazzling  all  men's  eyes.    But  it  was  now  grey  with 
the  slow  twilight  of  a  mysticism  that  was  dying  in 
men's  hearts  and  that  manifested  itself  only  in  fine 
words.     It  was  now  too  much  the  custom  to  deal 
directly  and  confidently  with  God,  and  Europe 
could  not  be  expected  to  tremble  when  its  mon- 
archs  spoke  loudly  in  His  name.     The  mionarchs 
themselves  showed  that  they  had  Httle  confidence 
that  it  would  be  so  when,  with  a  singular  contra- 
diction,   they   made    more    or    less    ambiguous 
promises  of  granting  constitutions.     The  obliga- 
tion to  do  so  was  inscribed  in  the  compact  of  the 
Germanic  Confederation,  and  the  Bourbons  them- 
selves had  to  promise  the  Holy  Alliance  that  they 
would  establish  a  constitution  and  give  to  their 
kingdom  representative  institutions.     Their  allies 
felt  sure  that,  notwithstanding   the   authenticity 
of    the  Bourbons'    title    to    sovereignty,   France 
would  not  for  a  single  day  have  tolerated  their 
absolute  rule.     But,   though   as   a  compensation 
for  her  lost  empire,  France  was  granted  represent- 
ative  government,   the    other  peoples  were    all 
cheated,  except  only  some  of  the  minor  members 
of  the  Germanic  Confederation.      Even    Prussia 
had  to  rest  content  with  the  modest  Provincial 
Diets  which  were  set  up  instead  of  a  parliament. 
France  having  been  chained  up,  the  absolutist 


The  League  of  the  Dynasties       35 

party  prevailed  practicall}^  all  over  Europe  under 
the  example  and  the  authorit}''  of  the  Courts  of 
Vienna  and  St.  Petersburg,  and  with  that  party 
triumphed  the  old  nobility,  the  younger  daughter, 
as  it  were,  of  legitimacy,  which  everywhere  seized 
the  monopoly  of  all  the  high  offices  of  State.  The 
aristocrats  were  now  deprived  of  the  last  traces  of 
their  sovereign  rights,  but  they  were  at  the  same 
time  freed  from  many  obligations  towards  the 
mass  of  the  people  and  the  middle  class.  In 
most  of  the  Courts  they  became  the  domestic  ser- 
vants of  the  new  absolutism  for  fear  of  the  Revo- 
lution and  the  levelling  laws  which  they  had 
banished  from  the  world.  The  consequence  was 
that  among  the  educated  middle  class  through- 
out Europe  there  immediately  began  a  growth  of 
parties,  secret  societies,  schools  of  art  and  philoso- 
phy, literary  and  intellectual  groups,  which  openly 
or  covertly  aimed  at  discrediting  as  without  war- 
rant the  Divine  Right  of  Kings,  aristocratic  govern- 
ment, and  the  whole  order  of  things  as  constituted 
by  the  Congress  of  Vienna,  and  which  dreamed  of 
nothing  less  than  freeing  the  Revolution  from  the 
fetters  imposed  upon  it  by  the  Restoration, 

It  was  in  1821  and  in  Italy  that  the  Revolution 
made  its  first  renewed  attempt.  Not  six  years 
from  the  day  on  which  he  had  resumed  possession 


36  Problems  of  Peace 

of  his  States  with  the  declared  intention  of  re- 
commencing where  he  had  left  off  on  going  into 
exile,  Victor  Emmanuel  I.,  was  compelled  to  ab- 
dicate by  a  revolutionary  movement,  the  purpose 
of  which  was  to  demand  a  constitution.    Unwilling 
to  yield,  or  to  summon  Austrian  assistance,  and 
not  having  the  courage  to  repress  the  Revolution 
which  was  favoured  by  part  of  his  troops,  he  pre- 
ferred to  hand  over  his  crown  and  sceptre  to  his 
brother,   Charles  FeUx.     An  instant's  hesitation 
on  the  part  of  the  army  had  sufficed  to  make  this 
Ruler,  whom  the  Congress  of  Vienna  had  recog- 
nized as  indefeasibly  legitimate,  lose  heart  and 
feel  his  authority  vanish.      It  was  a  clear  proof 
that  the  sole  title  of  authority  to  rule  was  force. 
In  the  same  year  broke  out  the  first  disturbances 
in  the  Balkans,  and  Greece  rose  against  the  domi- 
nation of  the  Turks.     It  is  well  to  observe  at  this 
point  how  every  great  crisis  in  the  ItaHan  question 
has  had  its  corresponding  movement  or  tumult, 
either  in  Poland  or  in  the  Balkans,  as  if  these  three 
afflicted  and  diseased  parts  of  the  continent  were 
connected  by  some  link  of  inward  sympathy.    In 
this  first  period  of  European  conflict,  Greece  was 
more  fortunate  than  Italy.     In  spite  of  Austrian 
intrigue,  the  Powers,  particularly  Russia,  which, 
in  order  to  secure  a  pretext  for  continuing  the  war 


The  League  of  the  Dynasties       37 

against  Turkey  and  for  continuing  to  expand  at 
the  expense  of  the  Turk,  secretly  fomented  the 
resistance  of  the  Balkan  peoples  to  the  Sultan,  in- 
tervened on  behalf  of  Greece.  Thus  it  happened 
that  Greece,  though  vanquished  by  the  Turks,  did 
not  rebel  in  vain,  for  when  she  was  on  the  point  of 
being  annihilated  by  her  powerful  adversary,  she 
was  saved  by  the  Powers.  In  1827,  the  British, 
French,  and  Russian  fleets  destroyed  the  Turkish 
fleet  at  Navarino.  In  1828,  Russia  declared  war 
on  Turkey,  and  in  the  following  year  forced  the 
Sultan  to  sue  for  peace.  In  1830,  Europe  estab- 
lished the  new  Kingdom  of  Greece  with  a  German 
dynasty  under  the  protection  of  Russia,  England, 
and  France,  and  recognized  the  Principality  of 
Serbia  under  the  high  patronage  of  Turkey, 

Italy  had  no  such  good  fortune.  Charles  Felix 
subdued  the  Revolution  and  a  civil  war  began 
which  was  destined  to  last  till  1859.  Dismayed 
by  this  first  awakening  of  the  revolutionary  spirit, 
and  stimulated  by  fear,  the  Italian  governments, 
which,  notwithstanding  the  false  patents  of  Divine 
Right  given  them  by  the  Congress  of  Vienna,  felt 
that  their  authority  was  insecure,  raged  furiously 
against  everything  which  savoured  of  "liberation" 
or  "novelty, "  which  reminded  them  of  the  Revolu- 
tion or  the  Empire,  not  only  in  France,  but  also  in 


38  Problems  of  Peace 

England  and  Germany,  or  which,  in  the  slightest 
degree  departed  from  the  official  views  of  politics, 
religion,  or  literature.  They  disdained  no  weapon, 
no  means  of  coercion,  no  instrument  of  torture. 
They  used  terrorism,  corruption,  the  censorship, 
espionage,  the  state  of  siege,  the  confessional,  the 
schools,  the  police,  and  the  army,  and  for  the  ulti- 
mate crisis,  Austrian  regiments  were  kept  ready 
near  the  frontier.  The  persecution  was  so  savage 
and  so  implacable,  that  the  new  spirit  was  forced 
to  hide  itself.  But  it  did  not  die.  On  the  contrary, 
in  silence  and  obscurity,  in  danger,  in  secret,  in 
sorrow,  it  became  strong  and  concentrated,  and 
gradually  permeated  with  invincible  tenacity,  the 
educated  bourgeoisie  and  the  better  part  of  the 
nobility.  Liberty,  representative  government,  ab- 
olition of  aristocratic  and  ecclesiastical  privilege, 
the  independence  and  unity  of  the  nation  became 
the  more  passionately  desired  objects  of  the  better 
part  of  the  people,  the  more  the  Austrian  Empire 
and  its  client  governments  in  Italy  strove  to  check 
their  longings. 

But  suspicion  and  terror,  if  they  could  not  crush 
the  new  spirit,  ruined  the  soul  of  the  nation. 
Fidelity  to  the  regime  became  the  principal  merit 
and  the  sole  title  to  the  benevolence  of  those  in 
power.    Therefore  in  all  public  offices,  in  the  police, 


The  League  of  the  Dynasties       39 

the  army,  the  universities,  and  in  the  adminis- 
tration of  the  country,  the  first  place  was  taken  by 
men  who  were  incompetent,  perverse,  and  corrupt, 
but  who  were  zealous  defenders  of  the  existing 
order  against  all  its  enemies,  open  or  concealed, 
real  or  imaginary.  Rectitude,  seriousness,  public 
spirit,  independence  of  character,  all  the  virtues 
which  could  not  bow  to  tyranny,  which  despised 
the  unjust  threats  of  power,  and  resisted  the  in- 
sidious temptations  of  corruption  were  despised 
and  suspected.  How  could  it  be  hoped  that  a 
corrupt  government,  which  asked  for  nothing  but 
blind  loyalty,  would  cure  the  abuses  under  which 
the  people  groaned,  or  reform  the  State?  The 
woes  of  Italy  increased,  but  the  more  her  institu- 
tions were  corrupted,  the  less  they  had  to  fear 
from  the  assaults  of  the  reformer.  The  vices  which 
were  the  allies  of  the  government,  such  as  the 
idleness,  the  drunkenness,  and  the  festive  dissipa- 
tion of  the  people,  the  frivolity  of  the  upper  and 
middle  classes,  enjoyed  a  large  measure  of  official 
protection.  Every  manifestation  of  high  culture 
was  frowned  upon,  if  not  persecuted.  Serious 
study  was  discouraged.  The  workers  in  literature, 
art,  science,  if  they  did  not  conform  their  pro- 
ductions to  the  flattery  of  the  great,  had  to 
proceed   very  warily,   for   night    and   day    they 


40  Problems  of  Peace 

were  under  the  eyes  of  a  jealous  and  malignant 
censorship. 

Governments  so  weak  and  so  insecure — always 
dreading  that  at  any  moment  the  Dragon  of  Re- 
volution might  break  its  bonds — necessarily  re- 
garded Austria  as  a  kind  of  St.  George  of  law  and 
order,  for  it  was  Austria  who  had  slain  the  Dragon. 
But  Austria  bestowed  her  protection  with  such 
skilful  perfidy!  She  did  not  exactly  treat  Lom- 
bardy  and  Venetia  as  slaves ;  she  allowed  them,  for 
example,  some  slight  freedom  to  read  and  to  study, 
to  discuss  and  even  to  carry  out  some  mild  reforms, 
and  to  receive,  from  France,  England,  and  Ger- 
many, some  not  too  perilous  innovations.  Com- 
pared with  the  strict  embargo  imposed  on  all  the 
other  States  in  the  peninsula,  except  the  Grand 
Duchy  of  Tuscany,  such  a  rule  might  almost  seem 
to  be  the  beginnings  of  liberty.  Elsewhere,  how- 
ever, Austria  supported  the  most  reactionary 
parties  and  forcibly  strangled  at  birth  all  desire 
for  reform,  all  aspirations  towards  freedom,  all 
criticism  and  expressions  of  patriotism,  and  all 
longing  for  innovation.  It  is  easy  to  understand 
the  object  of  this  policy.  It  was  to  persuade  the 
Lombards  and  the  Venetians  that  to  be  subjects 
of  the  Hapsburgs  was  the  greatest  good  fortune 
that  could  befall  any  member  of  the  Italian  family, 


The  League  of  the  Dynasties      41 

and  to  bind  to  herself  body  and  soul  all  the  other 
governments  in  Italy.  The  more  they  belaboured 
the  chained  Dragon  of  Revolution,  the  more  they 
were  bound  to  dread  its  breaking  loose,  and  the 
more  they  were  bound  to  fall  on  their  knees  and 
worship  the  invincible  lance  of  the  new  St.  George. 
This  foreign  power,  which  by  turns  oppressed  and 
favoured  parties  and  persons  according  to  the 
dictates  of  its  own  interests,  depraved  and  divided 
the  whole  peninsula.  The  oppressed  despaired  of 
liberty  and  justice,  and  even  of  revenge,  while 
the  oppressors,  believing  themselves  invulnerable 
grew  more  insolent  and  cruel.  Austrian  protection, 
in  fact,  corrupted  the  very  marrow  of  the  new 
Italian  governments  of  1815,  the  bones  of  which 
were  rotten  from  their  birth,  and  this  corruption 
attacked  not  only  the  States,  great  and  small,  into 
which  the  peninsula  was  divided,  but  also  an 
institution  in  their  midst  which  was  of  much 
greater  importance  by  reason  of  its  past  and  of  its 
spiritual  authority- — the  Church. 

It  is  necessary  to  elaborate  this  point  as  it  would 
not  otherwise  be  possible  to  explain  the  implacable 
resentment  felt  by  the  Italian  Revolution  towards 
the  Papacy — an  antagonism  of  which  in  later 
days,  the  astute  ambition  of  Prussia  was  destined 
to  take  advantage.     After  the  Reformation  in  the 


42  Problems  of  Peace 

seventeenth  and  eighteenth  centuries,  the  Church 
had  been  purified.     She  had  devoted  herself  in 
good  earnest  to  the  improvement  of  the  world, 
and  to  that  end  had  utilized  the  service  of  dis- 
tinguished moralists,  the  last  of  her  great  Saints, 
educational  and  charitable  institutions,  new  and 
renovated    monastic     orders.       The    nineteenth 
century  owed  some  of  its  virtues  to  the  education 
which   Catholic   Europe  had   received  from  the 
Church  during  the  previous  two  hundred  years. 
But  no  institution  had  suffered   more  from  the 
ruin  into  which  all  principles  of  legitimate  au- 
thority fell,  one  after  another,  towards  the  end  of 
the  seventeenth  and  the  beginning  of  the  eight- 
eenth century,  because  none  depended  more  on  a 
foundation  of  respect.     What  could  she  do  when 
she  had  lost  that  respect,  and  Europe — Revolu- 
tionist and  Royalist  alike — leapt  upon  her,  mocked 
and  trampled  upon  her  spiritual  aims,  despoiled 
her   of   her   wealth,    of   almost   all    her    ancient 
privileges  and  of  the  State  which  she  possessed 
in  Central  Italy?     When  the  great  revolutionary 
crisis  was  over,  and  she  was  able  to  free  herself 
from  her  persecutors,   and  struggle  to  her  feet 
again,  she  was  no  longer  what  she  had  been.    She 
had  lost  faith  in  her  own  authority.     She  had 
become  so  terrified  of  the  Revolution  that  she  was 


The  League  of  the  Dynasties       43 

no  longer  able  to  protect  herself  without  an  armed 
champion.  After  18 15,  the  Government  of  the 
Church  was  the  weakest  in  all  Italy,  the  most 
menaced  by  the  memories  and  the  ferments  left 
behind  by  the  French  domination,  the  one  which 
had  the  most  to  fear  from  the  destruction  of  the 
order  of  things  established  by  the  Congress  of 
Vienna,  and  most  depended  on  the  support  of 
foreign  armies.  From  weakness,  fear,  and  devo- 
tion to  the  little  State  it  possessed  in  Central  Italy, 
the  Papacy  then  made  the  mistake  of  authenti- 
cating the  false  patents  of  Divine  Right  granted 
to  itself  by  the  Congress  of  Vienna ;  for  the  eternal 
principles  of  order,  it  exchanged  the  ephemeral 
interests  of  a  party,  destined,  like  a  worm,  to  live 
for  an  hour.  It  confronted  the  new  spirit,  which 
was  endeavouring  to  reanimate  Italy,  with  clergy, 
high  and  low,  charitable  institutions,  and  monastic 
orders,  and  by  so  doing,  it  aroused  the  antagonism 
of  that  spirit.  It  was  in  vain  that  the  finer  spirits 
within  and  without  the  Church  protested  and 
lamented.  That  which  in  the  eighteenth  century 
had  been  a  lofty  throne  from  which  a  Clement 
XIV.  had  spoken,  was  now  a  little  Court  of  astute 
and  timid  politicians,  protected  and  dominated  by 
Austria  under  the  pontificate  of  a  Gregory  XVI. 
The  decadence  of  the  higher  clergy  kept  pace  with 


44  Problems  of  Peace 

that  of  the  Roman  Curia.  In  both,  during  the 
first  half  of  the  nineteenth  century,  those  who 
succeeded  were  narrow-minded  fanatics  and  un- 
scrupulous intriguers.  Boldness  and  ignorance, 
hypocrisy  and  corruption,  reigned  supreme.  The 
greater  institutions  became  mummified,  and  as  a 
necessary  consequence,  the  soul  languished.  Such 
a  decadence  was  rightly  more  odious  to  its  con- 
temporaries than  that  of  any  other  institution, 
for  the  office  of  the  Church  was  to  correct  the 
abuses  of  corrupt  Government,  not  to  propagate 
them  by  her  example. 

An  ancient  Italian  legend  teUs  how  a  tyrant  de- 
stroyed his  victims  by  chaining  each  to  a  corpse. 
The  Empire  of  Austria  had  bound  the  Italian 
people  to  the  corpse  of  a  dead  age.  This  was  the 
torture  to  which  the  peace  of  the  monarchs  had 
condemned  Italy.  Nor,  though  the  torments  were 
different,  had  France  and  Germany  been  spared. 
Italy  and  the  Balkan  Peninsula  were  the  most 
afflicted  parts  of  the  Continent,  but  the  heart  of 
Europe  was  diseased  as  well.  The  Congress  of 
Vienna  had  wished  not  to  leave  between  the  solid 
unities  of  France  and  Russia,  the  fluid  disaggrega- 
tion of  little  less  than  forty  independent '  States  of 

'  There  were,  to  be  precise,  thirty-four  States  and  four  free 
cities. 


The  League  of  the  Dynasties       45 

which  Germany  was  composed,  even  after  the  con- 
centration and  imification  bror.ght  about  by  the 
Revolution.  Owing,  however,  to  therivahies,  the 
distrust,  and  the  pride  of  the  Courts,  ancient  and 
modem,  it  had  not  been  able  to  gather  them  all 
together  again  under  the  sceptre  of  the  old  empire 
nor  to  bind  them  together  into  a  true  confederacy. 
After  much  discussion  and  many  proposals,  it  had 
been  finally  arranged  that  they  should  unite  under 
the  name  of  the  Germanic  Confederation,  in  a 
compact  of  mutual  understanding  and  for  com- 
mon defence.  Austria  and  Prussia  were  members 
of  the  Confederation  but  only  so  far  as  regarded 
such  of  their  territories  as  were  inhabited  by  Ger- 
mans. A  Diet,  meeting  at  Frankfort  and  com- 
posed of  representatives  of  all  the  Confederate 
States,  had  the  authority  to  make  laws  of  general 
concern.  States  which  had  no  territories  outside 
the  Confederation  could  not  make  war  without  its 
consent.  Yet  the  Confederation  had  an  army 
under  the  control  of  a  State  the  greater  part  of 
whose  territories  were  outside  the  Confederation, 
and  which  for  that  reason  had  little  concern 
with  the  affairs  of  Germany.  Undermined  by  the 
jealousies  of  Prussia  and  Austria,  represented  by  a 
Diet  to  which  the  people  had  no  access,  and  whose 
powers  were  ill-defined,  lacking  an  authoritative 


46  Problems  of  Peace 

head  and  vigorous  organs  of  government,  the 
Germanic  Confederation  was  a  mere  skeleton. 
This  skeleton  the  Congress  of  Vienna  had  invested 
with  the  Crown  and  Sceptre  and  the  ermine  of  the 
ancient  Empire — an  almost  sacrilegious  parody- 
in  the  eyes  of  Germany,  which  was  roused  at  last, 
but  too  late. 

It  was  in  the  last  days  of  Napoleon  that  Ger- 
many had  awakened  from  her  slumbers  in  the 
bosom  of  the  Holy  Roman  Empire.  During  the 
Campaigns  of  1813,  i8i4,and  1815  she  had  found 
again  her  ancient  passion  for  dangerous  adventure, 
had  recovered  her  self-confidence,  and  had  given 
the  first  proofs  of  her  strength  without  exhausting 
it  too  much  as  France  had  done.  She  had,  how- 
ever, intervened  in  the  great  movement  of  the 
century  only  when  it  was  about  to  come  to  an  end. 
Thus  she  was  placed  in  bondage  by  the  treaties  of 
1814-1815  to  a  peace  and  a  league  imposed  upon 
her  by  the  arbitrary  agreement  of  the  sovereigns 
at  the  very  time  when,  having  laid  all  heaven  under 
contribution,  she  was  beginning  to  wish  to  do 
something  similar  on  earth.  Germany,  therefore, 
like  Italy,  raged  inwardly  but  did  not  know 
whether  her  misfortunes  were  due  to  her  own 
impotence  or  to  the  servitude  to  which  absolutism 
had  condemned  her.    At  one  moment  she  longed 


The  League  of  the  Dynasties       47 

for  unity;  at  another  she  demanded  freedom; 
sometimes  she  cried  out  for  both.  At  times,  she 
resigned  herself  to  accepting  the  domination  of 
absolute  monarchs,  a  narrow  aristocracy,  and 
irresponsible  functionaries,  but  again  she  would 
lament  that  all  access  to  office  was  barred  to 
men  of  ability  without  ancestors  and  open  to  de- 
scendants without  ability,  and  that  thought  was 
hampered  by  censorship  and  inspection  by  the 
police;  and  she  longed  to  destroy  the  antiquated 
mise  en  scene  and  machinery  of  Divine  Right. 

On  the  other  hand  she  was  distressed  to  see 
the  fragments  of  German  unity  which  had  been 
shattered  by  the  Reformation  still  lying  dispersed 
all  over  Central  Europe.  She  reproached  her 
dynasties  and  her  governments  with  sacrificing 
Germany  to  their  personal  interests  and  to  peace, 
and  sighed  for  a  despot  through  whom  her  imi- 
fication  might  be  accomplished.  Unlike  Italy,  she 
v/as  not  oppressed  by  a  foreign  power  with  over- 
whelming forces  which  kept  the  nation  at  discord 
with  itself.  Her  governments,  though  suspected 
and  tyrannical,  did  not  suffocate  the  intelligence 
of  their  subjects.  It  was  not  their  object  to  make 
ignorance  a  bulwark  against  revolution.  They  at 
least  allowed  men  to  dream  in  prose  and  verse,  to 
rave  in  the  pages  of  history  and  in  volumes  of 


48  Problems  of  Peace 

philosophy.  Though  her  desires  were  unsatisfied, 
though  she  was  still  waiting  for  her  unification  and 
working  hard  to  repair  the  losses  of  the  Napoleonic 
Wars,  Germany  was  not,  like  Italy,  reduced  to 
despair  of  herself,  her  future,  and  the  whole  world. 
On  the  contrary,  she  lent  a  willing  ear  to  the  seduc- 
tive flatteries  of  her  historians  who  hailed  her  as 
the  greatest  nation  on  earth,  fomented  her  hatred 
of  France,  and  by  falsifying  the  past  encouraged 
the  most  extravagant  expectations  of  future  for- 
tune. Megalomania,  suspicion,  national  hyper- 
sensitiveness,  a  tendency  to  believe  herself  the 
victim  of  other  nations,  bitter  hatred  of  France — 
all  these  delusions  which  for  four  years  we  have 
seen  raging  on  land ,  on  sea,  and  in  the  air  date  from 
long  ago.  They  had  begun  to  torment  the  soul  of 
Germany  in  1815. 

France  had  no  more  reason  to  be  satisfied  than 
Germany.  The  peace  treaties  of  18 14  and  181 5 
had  deprived  her  of  all  she  had  won  in  twenty -five 
years  of  war.  They  had  moreover  imposed  upon 
her  a  dynasty  whose  ancient  titles  of  legitimacy 
were  no  longer  recognized  by  part  of  the  popiila- 
tion,  and  which  could  not  acquire  new  titles  by 
new  enterprises.  Pledged  to  respect  the  peace  of 
the  sovereigns,  hostile  to  revolutionary  and  Na- 
poleonic memories,  insecure  as  regards  its  own 


The  League  of  the  Dynasties       49 

fortunes  reborn  from  the  defeat  of  the  country, 
the  Restoration  had  even  decided  to  disband  the 
glorious  armies  of  the  Revolution  and  the  Empire, 
to  abolish  conscription,  and  to  return  to  military 
service  on  the  professional  principle.  This  design 
had  been  given  up  because  France  now  required  so 
large  an  army  that  its  ranks  could  not  be  filled  by 
voluntary  recruiting.  But,  though  the  Restora- 
tion was  thus  forced  to  use  the  armies  of  the  Re- 
volution and  the  Empire,  these  armies  were  spoiled 
and  weakened  as  much  as  possible;  they  were  dis- 
trusted and  condemned  to  be  the  silent  guardians 
of  a  somnolent  peace. 

While  Germany  was  distracted  with  a  v/ild 
longing  for  action,  France,  either  exhausted  by  her 
many  trials  or  disgusted  with  the  mediocre  posi- 
tion to  which  she  had  been  condemned  after  so 
many  glorious  adventures,  set  about  building  the 
mystic  city  of  the  future  in  those  vast  fields  of 
thought  which  Germany  until  a  few  years  before 
had  raided  so  impetuously.  It  is  well  known  that 
the  most  famous  German  systems  of  Philosophy 
were  eagerly  studied  and  professed  in  France  under 
the  Restoration  at  a  time  when  their  vogue  in 
Germany  had  already  long  ceased,  a  circumstance 
which  led  Edgar  Quinet  to  obseive  that  in  Philo- 
sophy France  "had  adopted  only  the  dead."     But 


50  Problems  of  Peace 

in  this  world  there  is  no  question  of  a  philosophy 
being  living  or  dead.  A  philosophy  serves  the 
interests,  the  passions,  and  the  vital  needs  of  an 
age  and  then  ceases  to  be  and  is  abandoned  like  a 
dead  thing  when  it  is  no  longer  useful.  The  wild 
Teutonic  systems  which  Germany  had  ceased  to 
study,  poetic  vehemence,  the  sentimental  melan- 
choly, and  the  theatrical  rebelliousness  of  German 
romanticism,  satisfied  the  restless  quest  for  new 
ideas,  new  doctrines,  and  new  kinds  of  beauty  with 
which  France  was  consoling  herself  for  the  medio- 
crity of  her  everyday  life.  They  nourished  the 
fervid  idealism  in  which  Christian  mysticism  was 
mingled  with  the  humanitarian  aspirations  of  the 
Revolution  and  the  heroic  spirit  of  the  Empire, 
and  which  generated  so  many  high-minded  theo- 
ries, from  the  doctrines  of  Lamennais  to  those 
of  socialism,  from  the  School  of  St.  Simon  to  that 
of  Fourier.  Among  these  theories  there  was  one 
which  many  generous  and  ardent  spirits  set  up 
against  the  prudent  and  constant  attachment  of 
the  Government  to  peace,  and  this  was  that  it 
was  the  mission  of  France  to  break  the  peace  of 
the  sovereigns,  to  free  the  oppressed  peoples  of 
Europe,  and  to  bring  about  a  true  peace  based  on 
the  brotherhood  of  redeemed  nations. 

The  position  of  Germany  more  resembled  that 


The  League  of  the  Dynasties       51 

of  Italy  than  that  of  France.  Both  Germany  and 
Italy  had  to  lament  the  loss  of  liberty.  Both  com- 
plained that  the  indivisible  soul  of  the  nation  had 
been  shattered  into  a  great  number  of  small  States 
at  variance  with  each  other  when  not  actually 
hostile.  Germany  and  Italy  should  therefore 
have  been  bound  together  by  mutual  sympathy 
in  a  common  misfortune.  But  this  did  not  come 
about.  Even  then  the  German  people  wanted 
unity  only  in  order  to  despoil  others.  The  parties 
opposed  to  absolute  power  were  already  bitterly 
reproaching  the  German  dynasties  because  they 
had  not  deprived  France  of  Alsace  and  Lorraine 
m  18 1 5  but  in  order  to  have  peace  had  allowed 
her  to  keep  these  provinces.  They  never  showed 
the  slightest  sympathy  for  the  Italian  provinces 
oppressed  by  Austria ;  on  the  contrary  they  openly 
rejoiced  that  the  strongest  power  in  the  Germanic 
Confederation  held  Italy  fast  in  its  talons.  France, 
on  the  other  hand,  which  had  for  so  many  years 
dominated  Italy  and  had  been  excluded  in  1815, 
which  might  have  looked  on  the  affairs  of  the 
peninsula  with  the  rancour  of  defeat  and  a  longing 
for  revenge,  was  moved  with  compassion  at  the 
sufferings  inflicted  on  Italy  between  1821  and 
1830  by  the  arrangements  of  the  Congress  of 
Vienna,  and  by  the  turbid  policy  of  Vienna,  and 


52  Problems  of  Peace 

the  Bourbon  Government  was  constrained  to  turn 
its  attention  to  what  was  happening  in  the  penin- 
sula. After  the  year  1825,  difficulties  and  differ- 
ences arose  between  the  Kingdom  of  France  and 
the  Em.pire  of  Austria  on  the  subject  of  Italian 
affairs. 

In  short,  though  it  would  be  an  exaggeration  to 
say  that  while  in  1830  the  sovereigns  wished  to 
keep  the  peace  the  peoples  wished  for  war,  it  is 
nevertheless  true  that  in  France  and  Germany  the 
peace  of  the  sovereigns  appeared  to  those  who  were 
opposed  to  absolute  monarchy  as  a  kind  of  prison 
in  which  Europe  had  been  confined  by  pusillani- 
mous monarchs  who  wanted  to  enjoy  the  sweets  of 
power  without  its  difficulties.  England,  Austria, 
and  Russia  on  the  other  hand  were  as  tranquil  as 
any  European  State  could  be  in  these  trying  times, 
because  they  were  satisfied  with  the  order  of  things 
estabhshed  by  the  Congress  of  Vienna.  When  the 
affairs  of  Europe  had  been  resettled,  England  had 
retired  to  her  island  and  had  busied  herself  with 
the  development  of  her  commerce.  She  took  no 
interest  in  continental  affairs  except  in  so  far  as 
these  affected  the  peace  and  quietness  of  the 
world  which  was  essential  for  her  comfort.  The 
protocols  of  the  Congress  of  Vienna  appeared  to 
her  therefore  to  be  perfect  and  practically  un- 


The  League  of  the  Dynasties       53 

alterable.  Only  a  few  men  of  intelligence  above 
the  average  shook  their  heads  over  this  short- 
sighted egoism.  Although  there  was  smouldering 
nationalist  discontent  in  Bohemia,  Hungary,  and 
Italy,  in  Austria  the  dynasty  was  strong  enough, 
in  spite  of  the  weakness  of  the  Emperor,  to  quell 
or  overawe  every  manifestation  of  liberal  unrest 
or  opposition.  The  prestige  of  its  authority  had 
been  much  increased  in  18 14  and  18 15.  The  un- 
tiring watchfulness,  the  strong  intelligence,  and 
the  astute  caution  of  Prince  Mettemich,  as  well  as 
the  devotion  of  the  Teutonic  aristocracy,  were  the 
foiindations  of  the  new  Austrian  power  which 
seemed  sure  of  itself.  In  Russia,  finally,  there  had 
appeared  a  strange  giant,  violent  and  mild,  capri- 
cious and  tenacious,  good  and  bad,  lovable  and 
terrible,  who,  through  all  the  alternations  of  an 
unstable  temperament,  firmly  adhered  to  one 
fixed  idea,  which  was  to  be  the  chief  prop  in  Europe 
of  legitimacy,  absolutism,  and  the  Holy  Alliance. 
This  was  Nicholas  I.  who  ascended  the  throne  of 
Russia  in  1825  on  the  death  of  his  brother  Alex- 
ander I.  Nicholas  not  only  believed  in  absolutism 
and  Divine  Right  with  a  mystical  fervour  but 
thought  of  himself  as  the  Head  of  the  great  family 
of  the  crowned  heads  of  Europe.  He  thought  it  to 
be  his  duty  by  example,  advice,  and,  if  necessary, 


54  Problems  of  Peace 

reproof,  to  keep  them  all  firm  in  the  defence  of  their 
principles  and  of  the  common  cause.  His  passion- 
ate energy  enabled  him  to  acquire  a  great  ascend- 
ancy over  many  weak  or  sceptical  princes.  His 
authority  in  the  Gennan  courts  was  great,  and 
greatest  of  all  after  1840  in  that  of  the  King  of 
Prussia,  Frederick  William  IV.,  who  admired  and 
loved  him  so  much  that  to  his  courtiers  it  seemed 
to  border  on  adoration. 

Neither  the  contented  egoism  of  the  EngUsh 
people,  however,  nor  the  haughty  mysticism  of 
Nicholas  I.,  nor  the  astuteness  of  Mettemich  and 
the  renovated  prestige  of  the  Hapsburgs,  could 
long  maintain  intact  a  state  of  matters  against 
which  were  leagued  so  many  sorrows,  hopes,  and 
aspirations.  Six  years  after  the  Congress  of  Vienna , 
Revolution  had  tried  to  break  its  chains  in  Pied- 
mont. In  1830  it  succeeded  not  in  the  capital  of  a 
little  State  but  in  Paris  itself,  the  city  of  its  birth 
and  its  historic  seat.  Legitimate  government  on 
the  bare  word  of  the  Bourbons  had  not  been  able  to 
resist  for  more  than  fifteen  years  the  discontent  of 
the  middle  and  educated  classes  who  wished  for 
a  larger  share  of  power,  and  the  national  vanity 
which  was  wounded  by  the  inertia  of  the  Govern- 
ment and  by  its  connivance  at  the  work  of  the 
enemies  of  France.     In  July,  1830,  the  people  of 


The  League  of  the  Dynasties       55 

Paris  rose  and  overthrew  the  Bourbons.  They 
were  successful  not  because  the  people  in  arms 
were  invincible,  but  because  the  army  in  Paris, 
recruited  from  the  people  and  affected  with  its 
discontent,  hesitated  at  the  critical  moment,  and 
the  monarchy,  feehng  its  forces  fail,  ceased  to 
trust  to  its  counterfeit  legitimacy,  threw  crown 
and  sceptre  to  the  rabble,  and  fled.  The  Holy 
Alliance  was  horrified  to  see  the  Revolution  in 
Paris  with  gunpowder -blackened  hands  crowning 
Louis  Philippe  of  Orleans  King  of  the  French. 
From  one  end  of  Europe  to  the  other  the  principle 
of  legitimacy  tottered.  Belgium  revolted,  deter- 
mined to  be  separated  from  Holland.  The  States 
of  Central  Germany  already  in  possession  of  con- 
stitutional government,  such  as  Bavaria,  Wurttem- 
berg,  and  Baden,  were  in  a  state  of  unrest  and 
seemed  inclined  to  turn  their  backs  on  Prussia, 
which  remained  obstinately  shut  up  in  her  obscure 
absolutism,  and  to  worship  the  sun  which  was  ris- 
ing in  France.  Poland  rose  in  rebellion.  In  Italy, 
a  revolution  broke  out  in  the  Papal  States  and  at 
Bologna  the  deposition  of  the  temporal  power  of 
the  Holy  See  was  proclaimed.  Some  hoped  and 
others  feared  that  the  peace  of  the  sovereigns  was 
about  to  be  broken,  not  by  the  insurgent  peoples 
who  were  weak,  but  by  the  new  King  of  the  French 


56  Problems  of  Peace 

who  had  received  his  sceptre  and  his  sword  from 
the  Revolution.  Had  not  the  Bourbons  been 
overthrown  by  national  exasperation  at  the 
humiliation  inflicted  on  France  by  the  Congress 
of  Vienna?  Had  not  the  Revolution  of  1830  been 
the  signal  for  the  revival  all  over  France  of  her 
mystic  faith  in  a  mission  to  free  the  world  ?  Would 
not  the  new  King  have  to  try  new  ways  if  not  for 
the  love  of  glory  at  any  rate  from  hatred  of  his 
predecessors  ?  The  memory  of  the  first  revolution 
was  too  fresh  for  Europe  not  to  fear  or  hope  that 
the  second  would  in  all  respects  follow  in  the  foot- 
steps of  its  predecessor.  And  in  fact,  on  December 
I,  1830,  Lafitte,  the  President  of  the  Council  of 
Ministers,  declared  in  the  Chamber  that  "France 
would  not  permit  any  great  Power  to  intervene 
either  in  Belgium  or  in  Italy  to  overpower  by 
force  the  will  of  small  nations. "  Sebastiani,  the 
Minister  of  Foreign  Affairs,  at  the  sitting  of  Decem- 
ber 28th,  contrasted  this  policy  with  that  of  the 
Holy  Alliance. 

The  Holy  Alliance  has  made  its  own  the  principle 
of  intervention  which  annihilates  the  independence 
of  small  nations.  The  principle  of  non-intervention 
which  we  support,  and  for  which  we  shall  know  how  to 
secure  respect,  secures  liberty  and  independence  for  all. 


The  League  of  the  Dynasties       57 

The  right  of  small  nations  to  dispose  of  their  own 
governments,  of  which  so  much  has  been  heard 
during  the  European  war,  had  already  appeared 
in  the  protocols  of  French  diplomacy  in  1830. 

Its  appearance  was,  however,  timid  and  short. 
It  lasted  until  the  Austrian  Empire  in  Italy  met 
the  prohibition  lodged  by  France  by  intervening 
first  in  the  Duchies  and  then  in  the  Legations  to 
repress  the  revolution.  This  at  once  confronted 
the  Government  of  Louis  Philippe  with  a  dilemma. 
They  had  either  to  make  war  or  to  yield.  They 
yielded.  Great  was  the  resentment  of  the  Italian 
liberals  who  roundly  accused  the  French  of  be- 
traying them.  This  was  very  natural,  but  it  is 
easy  to  see  how  it  was  that  when  the  France  and 
Austria  of  that  day  confronted  each  other,  France 
after  her  rash  threats  did  not  dare  to  strike.  How 
could  France  make  war  on  Austria  in  Italy  and  for 
Italy  in  the  face  of  English,  Russian,  and  German 
disapproval  without  a  point  d'appui,  a  base  of 
operations,  and  a  secure  ally  in  the  peninsula? 
Such  an  ally  would  only  be  Piedmont,  the  guardian 
of  the  gates  of  Italy,  who  in  those  days  kept  guard 
in  the  interests  of  Austria.  Since  1815,  Austria 
had  spared  no  pains  to  keep  Piedmont  under  her 
control  for  this  very  purpose,  and  had  exported 
many  an  archduchess  to  espouse  the  Princes  of 


58  Problems  of  Peace 

the  House  of  Savoy.  Austrian  influence  was  so 
powerful  at  Turin  that  in  1831  Charles  Albert, 
who  had  succeeded  his  brother  Carlo  Felice, 
though  tinged  wath  liberalism,  and  even  Carbon- 
arism,  had  been  immediately  compelled  to  yield 
to  the  Austrian  party  and  to  ingratiate  himself 
with  the  all-powerful  empire.  For  France  to 
attack  Austria  in  Italy  without  an  alliance  with 
Piedmont  would  have  been  as  mad  an  enterprise 
as  to  attack  the  moon. 

Thus,  although  the  Revolution  of  1830  seemed 
to  the  hopes  and  fears  of  its  contemporaries  to 
possess  the  stature,  the  features,  and  the  fiery 
impulse  of  its  great  sister  of  1789,  the  second  Re- 
volution was  after  all  but  a  little  sister,  lacking  the 
elan,  the  audacity,  and  the  mystical  self-confidence 
of  its  predecessor.  Using  the  cold  calculations  of 
the  politician  and  the  soldier,  the  Revolution  of 
1830  decided  that  Austria  was  too  strong  in  Italy, 
and  the  Holy  Alliance  in  Europe,  and  felt  un- 
equal to  defying  them.  Italy  was  therefore  aban- 
doned to  the  talons  of  the  two-headed  eagle. 
Neither  could  France  do  anything  for  insurgent 
Poland  nor  encourage  and  help,  nor  enlist  on  her 
side  the  revolutionary  unrest  which  had  been 
stirring  the  constitutional  States  of  Germany 
since  its  success.     Nicholas  I.,  whose  teeth  had 


The  League  of  the  Dynasties       59 

been  set  on  edge  by  the  admission  to  the  family 
of  crowned  heads  of  the  new  King  who  owed  his 
royalty  to  the  Paris  revolutionists,  pitilessly  re- 
pressed the  Polish  rebellion.  He  encouraged  the 
German  sovereigns  to  yield  nothing  to  the  unrest 
of  their  subjects  who  had  been  stirred  by  events 
in  Paris.  And  so  the  Revolution  of  1830,  re- 
strained partly  by  its  own  weakness  and  partly  by 
the  strength  of  the  opposite  principle,  did  not  dare 
to  cross  the  frontier.  Belgium  alone  gained  by  it, 
being  recognized  by  the  Powers  as  an  independent 
State  under  a  monarchical  government  limited 
only  by  its  neutrality — a  precaution  taken  by 
England  against  France,  which  in  1914  was  des- 
tined to  become  suddenly  a  deadly  danger  for 
England  herself.  As  the  movement  had  failed  to 
spread  over  Europe,  it  soon  exhausted  itself  in  its 
own  country  in  trifling  reforms  carried  out  behind 
dosed  doors.  Little  by  little,  LxDuis  Philippe  re- 
conciled himself  with  the  Holy  Alliance,  made  his 
peace  with  Divine  Right,  came  to  an  understanding 
^vdth  Austria,  and  entered  the  League  of  Monarchs 
for  preserving  peace.  He  continued  to  respect 
the  representative  institutions  which  he  was  not 
strong  enough  to  destroy,  but  he  took  care  that 
even  in  France  the  Government  should  remain  in 
the  hands  of  a  narrow  oligarchy  of  nobles  and  rich 


6o  Problems  of  Peace 

men,  the  people  being  excluded  and  the  middle 
and  educated  classes  reduced  to  the  position  of 
clients.  He  sought  an  outlet  for  the  heroic  aspira- 
tions of  a  section  of  French  opinion  in  the  conquest 
of  Algeria,  and  he  tried  to  stifle  the  romantic 
longings,  the  ambition,  the  fighting  spirit,  and 
the  criticisms  of  the  political  parties  and  the 
intellectual  classes  by  encouraging  the  pursuit  of 
riches. 

An  immense  change  in  the  history  of  the  world 
was  beginning.  The  era  of  iron  and  fire,  of  railways, 
and  steam  machinery  had  commenced  in  England, 
France,  and,  to  some  extent,  in  Prussia.  Men  who 
by  the  aid  of  a  few  machines  of  wood,  actuated  by 
water  or  animal  power,  had  hitherto  made  a  few 
things  of  excellent  quality  with  much  patient 
labour,  now  had  it  in  their  power  to  make  and 
drive  machines  of  iron  which  were  capable  of  tire- 
lessly repeating  the  same  movements  night  and 
day  with  prodigious  rapidity,  and  of  producing  in 
an  hour  what  could  not  be  made  by  human  hands 
in  a  whole  day.  "Are  they  gods  or  devils?"  was 
the  question  which  men  put  to  themselves  in 
anxiety  and  stupefaction  in  the  jDresence  of  these 
machines.  They  had  some  of  the  attributes  of 
divinity,  for  they  could  annihilate  time  and  space; 
they  produced  abundance  and  worked  miracles. 


The  League  of  the  Dynasties       6i 

But  they  were  creatures  of  man,  made  by  his  hand 
for  his  service,  and  could  man  create  divinity  and 
have  it  for  his  slave?  For  a  time  the  world  hesi- 
tated, but  England  led  the  way,  crying  that  the 
machines  were  powerful  giants  and  at  the  same 
time  docile  servants  of  man  who,  obedient  to  his 
nod,  would  bring  back  the  golden  age  and  a  time  of 
plenty  on  earth.  Now  France,  under  the  reign  of 
Louis  Philippe,  began  to  follow  England's  example, 
and  to  people  the  world  with  these  new  and  miracu- 
lous giants,  and  it  was  not  long  before  she  was 
imitated  by  Prussia.  The  Prussian  monarchy, 
meekly  obeying  the  influence  of  the  Russian  Court, 
remained  firmly  attached  to  the  principles  of 
absolutism  and  to  the  polic}'-  of  respecting  the 
peace  of  the  sovereigns.  But,  in  compensation  for 
that,  every  care  was  at  once  taken  to  help  the 
people  to  increase  their  riches.  On  Prussian  initi- 
ative, a  Customs  union  between  the  States  of  the 
Germanic  Confederation,  excluding  Austria,  was 
estabUshed  in  1834,  so  that  Germany  became  at 
least  an  economic  unity.  As  far  as  was  possible 
(Prussia  was  then  still  a  poor  country)  the  Prus- 
sian government  encouraged  and  assisted  its  sub- 
jects to  appropriate  to  themselves  all  the  new 
scientific  industrial  discoveries  which  could  in- 
crease the  power  and  well-being  of  the  nation. 


62  Problems  of  Peace 

Austria  was  more  diffident.  Without  openly  com- 
bating the  new  industries  she  favoured  them  less 
than  England,  France,  and  Prussia.  The  absolute 
governments  of  Italy,  on  the  other  hand,  pro- 
scribed industry  on  the  great  scale  altogether. 
There  should  be  neither  banks  nor  newly  invented 
machines  nor  even  railways,  for  they  secretly 
identified  all  these  innovations  with  Revolution. 
The  first  line  of  railway  in  Italy,  that  from  Naples 
to  Torre  Annunziata,  was  not  built  until  1840,  and 
not  more  than  233  kilometres  of  track  had  been 
constructed  before  1848.  A  new  humiliation  was 
added,  therefore,  between  1830  and  1840  to  the 
old,  and  it  cut  to  the  heart  every  Italian  who 
admired  from  afar  the  development  of  European 
civilization.  While  each  day  brought  wonderful 
strides  of  progress  to  other  peoples,  while  man  was 
on  the  point  of  becoming  omnipotent,  thanks  to  the 
new  titans,  was  Italy  alone  to  vegetate  in  poverty, 
idleness,  and  ignorance,  chained  to  the  customs  and 
the  ideas  of  an  age  that  was  now  dead?  Though 
she  had  lost  all  hope  of  succour  from  France,  Italy 
could  not  resign  herself  to  such  a  fate,  and  she 
grew  more  and  more  restless,  especially  after  1840. 
From  one  end  of  the  peninsula  to  the  other  books 
and  theories  multiplied.  Giuseppe  Mazzini  pre- 
dicted unification  and  a  republic,  Vincenzo  Gio- 


The  League  of  the  Dynasties       63 

berti  federation  under  the  Presidency  of  the  Pope. 
Others  dreamed  of  a  catholic  renaissance.  A  few 
began  to  hint  at  a  social  revolution  which  would 
cure  all  ills  by  destroying  them  utterly,  while  some 
good  patriots  in  their  despair  and  disillusion  asked 
whether,  since  Lombardy  and  Venetia  were  the 
only  provinces  which  enjoyed  some  slight  measiu'e 
of  liberty  and  not  wholly  inept  government,  it 
would  not  be  better  that  Austria  should  take 
possession  of  the  whole  peninsula.  The  unrest 
over  all  Europe,  which  gradually  increased  as  the 
generation  grew  up  which  had  not  seen  the  wars  of 
the  Revolution  and  the  Empire,  the  opposition  to 
absolutism  of  the  middle  and  cultivated  classes, 
and  even  of  part  of  the  autocracy,  which  grew 
stronger  every  year  in  every  country,  encouraged 
the  ardour  of  Italy.  Every  now  and  then  a  group 
of  high-spirited  and  impatient  young  men  would 
join  in  an  attem.pt  at  revolution  and  remind  Europe 
that  Italy  was  still  alive  and  still  afflicted.  Finally, 
in  1846,  because  the  Hapsburg  veto  did  not  arrive 
in  time,  the  Conclave  elected  as  Pope  Cardinal 
Mastai  Ferretti,  a  high-minded  man  who  was 
opposed  to  the  horrible  government  which  tor- 
mented the  States  of  the  Church.  He  immediately 
proclaimed  an  amnesty — initiated  several  timid 
but  good  reforms,  and  set  an  example  by  which 


64  Problems  of  Peace 

Italy  was  deeply  moved.  It  almost  seemed  as  if 
Gioberti's  prediction  was  about  to  come  true  when 
Europe  was  convulsed,  as  by  an  earthquake,  by 
the  Revolution  of  1848. 


CHAPTER  IV 

THE  REVOLUTION  OF  1 848 

The  convulsion  of  1848  was  universal.  This 
time  the  Revolution  scoured  Europe.  It  began 
in  Sicily,  which  revolted  on  January  12th,  compel- 
ling the  King  of  Naples  to  grant  a  constitution 
on  February  loth.  Next  came  the  turn  of  Paris 
which  towards  the  end  of  February  upset  the 
monarchy  of  Louis  Philippe  and  proclaimed  a 
Republic.  Once  more  a  government  whose  only 
secure  title  to  authority  was  force  gave  itself  up 
for  lost  and  fled  the  moment  its  army,  infected 
by  the  public  discontent,  showed  signs  of  vacil- 
lating. But  no  sooner  did  it  become  known  in 
Europe  that  the  Republic  had  re-arisen  from  its 
tomb  in  Paris,  than  there  was  a  universal  explosion 
of  all  the  aspirations,  the  ambitions,  the  illusions, 
and  the  resentment  that  had  been  accumulating 
in  the  hearts  of  the  educated  bourgeoisie  for  the 
last  thirty  years. 

In  Piedmont,  which  had  for  years  been  restless, 

Carlo  Alberto  had  no  alternative  but  to  grant  a 
s  65 


66  Problems  of  Peace 

constitution  on  March  4th.     All  Germany  was 
thrilled.     Liberal  constitutions,  abolition  of  privi- 
lege, freedom  of  the  press,  the  arming  of  the 
people,  the  right  of  petition  and  association,  pub- 
lic and  oral  procedure  in  the  courts,  liberty  of 
conscience,  the  unification  of  Germany,  popular 
election  to  the  Diet  of  the  Confederation; — all 
these  things   were  demanded  by  Germans  who 
had  suddenly  awakened,  in  mass  meetings,  in  the 
public  newspapers,  and  in  their  legislative  assem- 
blies.    On   March    19th,  the  populace  of  Berlin 
rose  in  rebellion  and  discomfited  the  army,  but, 
having  broken  this  barrier,  they  did  not  proceed  as 
at  Paris,  to  overthrow  the  monarchy.     On  the  con- 
trary they  contented  themselves  with  the  King's 
promise  that  a  constitution  should  be  granted  to 
them  and  that  their  States  and  Princes  would  be 
summoned  to  form  a  common  assembly  which 
would    provide    for    the    destinies    of  Germany. 
In  this  plan  the  King  of  Prussia  had  been  antici- 
pated by  a  Committee  of  patriotic  Liberals  which 
met  at  Heidelberg  on  March  5th  and  drafted  a 
scheme  for  a  national  German  Parliament,  invit- 
ing all  past  and  present  members  of  German  legis- 
latures to  come  and    discuss  it  at  Frankfort  on 
March  30th. 

Even  more  violent  was  the  repercussion  of  the 


The  Revolution  of  1848  67 

Paris  revolution  in  the  Austrian  Empire.  In  the 
eariy  days  of  March  the  Hungarian  Diet,  declaring 
itself  a  Constituent  Assembly,  approved  a  body 
of  laws  which  made  Htmgary  a  constitutional 
State.  On  the  13th,  disturbances  began  at  Vienna. 
On  the  15th,  the  Emperor  dismissed  Prince  Metter- 
nich  and  half  his  Empire  was  immediately  in 
flames.  In  Bohemia  the  people  of  Prague  met 
and  appointed  a  kind  of  Provisional  Government 
under  the  name  of  the  National  Committee  which 
sent  two  delegates  to  the  "King  of  Bohemia"  at 
Vienna  to  demand  the  restoration  of  a  united 
Bohemian  Kingdom  under  constitutional  govern- 
ment. At  Agram  a  Croatian  national  committee 
was  constituted  which  appointed  General  Jel- 
lachich  as  Ban  and  sent  a  deputation  to  Vienna. 
Italy  revolted.  At  Venice,  Brescia,  and  Milan 
the  people  took  arms  and  drove  out  the  Austrians. 
The  revolution  even  reached  Denmark  where 
the  Duchy  of  Holstein,  inhabited  by  Germans 
and  forming  part  of  the  Germanic  Confederation, 
rebelled.  In  a  few  weeks  the  whole  fabric  of 
Divine  Right  and  the  false  legitimacy  of  the  Holy 
Alliance,  like  a  canvas  building  whose  inward 
support  has  given  way,  collapsed  all  over  Europe 
except  in  Russia.  There  Nicholas  I.  was  on  his 
guard. 


68  Problems  of  Peace 

But,  though  all  the  greater  nations  of  Europe 
rebelled  in  1848,  they  did  not  all  rebel  for  the 
same  reasons.  In  1848,  it  was  not  a  single  revolu- 
tion but  a  catena  of  separate  revolutions.  In 
France  the  revolution  upset  not  only  the  oligarchy 
of  nobles  and  moneyed  men  which  had  enabled 
Louis  Philippe  to  dominate  the  coimtry  through 
his  Court  and  his  Parliament.  It  had  at  once 
attempted  a  greater  achievement — no  less  indeed 
than  to  locate  finally  in  the  Will  of  the  People 
the  new  fount  of  legitimate  authority  and  a 
spiritual  force  which  was  capable  of  giving  men 
the  justice,  liberty,  and  happiness  which  had  been 
falsely  promised  them  by  the  regimes  which  had 
passed  away.  In  the  presence  of  the  ruins  of  the 
second  kingdom  which  had  been  overthrown  by 
the  people  little  more  than  thirty  years  after  its 
foundation,  first  the  actual  combatants  and  then 
the  whole  of  France  were  seized  with  an  immense 
enthusiasm.  Did  not  these  victories  prove  that 
the  time  had  come  when  the  people  would  no 
longer  be  the  despised  flock  at  the  mercy  of  so 
many  false  authorities,  human  and  divine,  but 
the    strong,    wise,    and    just    shepherd  of  itself? 

Carried  away  by  this  enthusiasm  the  Pro- 
visional Government  had  proclaimed  a  Republic, 
subject   to  the  ratification  of  the  people,   who 


The  Revolution  of  1848  69 

should  be  called  upon  all  and  sundry  to  elect 
a  Constituent  Assembly.  They  had  set  about 
preparing  the  election  of  this  body,  or  rather  tak- 
ing the  preliminary  steps  which  were  necessary  in 
order  that  the  miracle  in  vain  attempted  by  the 
first  Revolution  should  now  be  performed  before 
the  eyes  of  an  astonished  world.  That  miracle 
was  that  the  people,  liberated  from  its  chains, 
should  remove  the  final  cause  of  all  tyrannies  by 
solving  the  irreconcilable  contradiction  between 
the  right  to  command  and  the  duty  to  obey,  and 
fusing  them  in  its  o\\ti  will  obedient  to  itself, 
obeying  itself  as  if  another  had  commanded,  and 
commanding  itself  as  if  another  was  to  obey. 

In  Piedmont  the  movement  which  had  threat- 
ened to  develop  into  a  Revolution  had  a  politi- 
cal object.  It  did  not  seek  to  introduce  a  new 
principle  of  authority  into  the  world  but  merely 
to  open  the  gates  of  power  slightly,  and,  by  means 
of  a  prudent  constitution  with  a  tiraocratic  and 
oligarchical  franchise  to  admit  a  part  of  the  rich 
and  educated  bourgeoisie.  Milan,  Venice,  and 
Brescia,  on  the  other  hand,  had  made  a  revolution 
in  order  to  drive  out  the  foreigner.  In  Vienna 
the  Revolution  was  aimed  at  absolutism  and  the 
aristocracy,  while  in  Bohemia  and  Hungary  its 
efforts  were  directed  to  securing  at  the  same  time 


70  Problems  of  Peace 

liberal  institutions  and  deliverance  from  the 
German  yoke.  In  Germany,  finally,  the  Revolu- 
tion dreamed  confusedly  of  giving  the  German 
peoples  liberty,  unity,  and,  above  all,  their  old 
imperial  power. 

Thus  the  history  of  1848  and  of  the  following 
year  is  at  the  same  time  unified  and  disjointed — 
unified  because  the  popular  movements  were 
interconnected,  disjointed  because,  although  they 
sprang  one  from  another,  they  were  often  different 
and  sometimes  contradictory  in  character.  To- 
gether they  form  a  disparate  unity  which  it  is 
difficult,  but  necessary,  to  study,  for  in  it  we  shall 
find  the  seeds  and  the  beginning  of  all  the  crises, 
the  struggles,  and  the  disturbances  which  agitated 
Europe  until  the  outbreak  of  the  world  war. 

Meanwhile  there  appeared  on  the  barricades  of 
Paris,  for  the  first  time  in  history,  two  personali- 
ties destined  to  be  much  talked  of  thereafter — the 
Proletariat  and  Socialism.  The  giants  of  iron 
animated  by  fire  which  men  adored  as  gods,  and 
which  they  proposed  to  use  as  slaves,  had  increased 
in  numbers,  in  power,  and  in  size  during  the  pre- 
vious twenty  years,  vitiating  the  pure  air  above 
a  hundred  cities  with  their  sooty  breath.  But 
mankind  had  waited  in  vain  for  the  benefits  which 
had  been  hoped  for  when  they  made  their  appear- 


The  Revolution  of  1848  71 

ance.  Indeed  it  had  been  asked  whether,  after 
all,  these  supposed  gods  were  not  mocking  and 
malignant  demons  who  were  making  game  of 
their  masters.  It  was  true  that  they  could  pro- 
duce abundance,  but  that  abundance,  far  from 
proving  a  blessing,  seemed  to  be  a  new  disaster 
worse  than  the  old  scarcity.  For,  when  things 
became  plentiful  and  cheaper  and  people  hoped 
to  enjoy  them  freely,  at  once  factories  were  closed, 
industries  went  bankrupt,  and  the  workmen, 
thrown  on  the  streets,  found  themselves  languish- 
ing with  hunger  on  the  threshold  of  warehouses 
crammed  with  commodities  which  were  useless 
because,  while  one  party  was  unable  to  sell  the 
other  was  unable  to  buy. 

Neither  was  the  hope  confirmed  that  these  new 
divinities  would  liberate  men  from  the  servitude 
of  labour.  On  the  contrary,  the  artisan  now  had 
to  work  more  than  ever — from  dawn  till  dusk,  day 
and  night,  without  raising  his  eyes  from  his  ma- 
chine for  a  minute.  He  had  to  labour  in  silence  like 
a  prisoner  under  the  compulsion  of  implacable 
taskmasters,  in  immense  workshops  where  the 
light  was  often  bad  and  the  air  mephitic,  and 
where  any  one  who  entered  had  for  the  whole  day 
to  make  himself  a  temporary  slave,  abdicating  all 
his  rights  as  a  man  and  a  citizen,  and  bowing  before 


72  Problems  of  Peace 

a  master  who  for  him  was  little  less  than  a  god, 
because  it  was  he  from  whom  men  had  now  to 
ask  that  for  which  they  formerly  prayed  to  God 
Himself — their  daily  bread.  They  were  fortunate 
if  this  subsistence,  gained  with  so  much  travail  and 
himiiliation,  was  at  least  secure  and  continuous. 
When  one  looked  from  the  misery  of  the  common 
people  to  the  riches  of  the  great  there  was  no 
comfort  in  the  comparison.  These  gods  on  earth 
seemed  to  spread  a  contagion  of  evil  passions — 
cupidity,  pride,  venality,  tyranny,  envy,  treachery, 
fraud,  and  injustice.  The  thirst  for  gold  had  per- 
verted the  world;  everything  was,  or  was  on  the 
point  of  being,  for  sale.  Genius,  justice,  truth, 
science — all  the  good  things  of  the  world  seemed 
to  come  from  a  mocking  God  who  delighted  in 
outraging  intelligence,  virtue,  and  merit.  Every- 
where successful  and  unscrupulous  cunning  was 
seen  reaping  the  harvest  which  had  been  sown  by 
genius,  courage,  or  sagacity. 

These  evils  are  common  to  all  countries  in  the 
first  days  of  the  development  of  industry  on  the 
grand  scale.  France,  however,  had  suffered  more 
keenly  because  she  was  a  cultivated  nation,  re- 
fined by  many  centuries  of  civilization,  by  the 
heroic  ideals  of  chivalry,  by  classic  culture,  by 
Catholicism,  by  the  generous  hopes  of  the  eight- 


The  Revolution  of  1848  73 

eenth  century  and  the  Revolution.  Was  France, 
therefore,  to  conclude  that  the  pretended  gods 
were  monsters,  hostile  to  mankind?  Fascinated 
as  she  was  by  the  noble  Utopias  of  progress,  she  did 
not  dare  to  condemn  one  of  its  most  portentous 
manifestations.  She  accused  herself,  and  blamed 
the  ignorance  and  the  selfishness  of  men  them- 
selves, who  spoiled  the  divine  gifts  of  which  Pro- 
gress was  so  liberal.  It  was  between  1830  and 
1848,  in  the  midst  of  the  ideal  fervour  by  which 
France  was  so  deeply  moved,  that  socialism 
was  bom,  or  rather  vigorousy  developed  from 
germs  left  behind  by  the  Revolution  but  hitherto 
dormant. 

This  body  of  diverse  doctrines,  often  confused 
and  faintl}^  adumbrated,  spread  rapidly  among 
the  workers  in  the  great  cities.  Its  grand  object 
was  to  discover  the  miraculous  secret  which 
would  cleanse  the  great  industries  of  the  cruelties, 
injustices,  corruptions,  and  perversions  with  which 
they  were  stained  through  the  fault  not  of  its 
godlike  machinery,  but  of  the  men  who  were 
unworthy  to  control  it!  Socialism  was  pro- 
pagated by  a  band  of  writers,  some  ingenious, 
some  puerile,  some  fantastic,  and  some  profound, 
pre-eminent  among  whom  was  Prudhon,  one  of  the 
most  powerful  minds  of  the  century.     It  occurred 


74  Problems  of  Peace 

to  n  one  of  them  to  inquire  whether  there  was  not  a 
revival  in  the  world  of  the  ancient  fire-worship 
professed  by  mankind  many  thousand  years 
ago. 

On  the  barricades  of  1848,  as  in  preceding 
revolutions,  the  workmen  of  Paris  had  fought  in 
great  numbers.  In  other  European  States  the 
rebellion  had  been  mainly  a  revolt  of  the  educated 
bourgeoisie,  aided  no  doubt  by  the  workers, 
against  absolutism  and  government  by  aristo- 
cracy. In  France  it  had  also  been  a  revolt  of  the 
Socialist  proletariat  against  what  was  afterwards 
called  the  capitalist  regime.  This  time  the 
workers  not  only  demanded  as  the  prize  of  vic- 
tory liberty,  the  right  to  vote,  and  a  republic. 
They  required,  and  secured,  the  admission  to  the 
Provisional  Government  of  three  representatives 
of  Socialism,  Flocon,  LxDuis  Blanc,  and  Albert. 
On  February  28th  they  went  in  a  great  procession 
to  the  H6tel  de  Ville,  brandishing  before  the  eyes 
of  the  Parisians  banners  on  which  was  inscribed 
"Ministry  of  Progress  and  Organized  Labour." 
They  compelled  the  Provisional  Government  to 
set  up  on  that  very  day  a  government  commission 
for  workmen,  whose  duty  would  be  to  study 
the  labour  question.  They  desired  the  Com- 
mission, through  a  delegation  appointed  by  their 


The  Revolution  of  1848  75 

unions,  to  diminish  the  hours  of  work,  and  they 
set  on  foot  an  agitation  with  a  view  to  securing 
that  the  new  RepubHc  should  recognize  the  right 
to  work  in  its  fundamental  laws.  Were  the  men, 
who  for  so  many  centuries  had  had  to  be  compelled 
to  work  as  a  duty,  now  freely  offering  their  shoul- 
ders to  the  burden  and  loudly  demanding  work  as 
a  right  ?  Was  what  had  of  old  been  considered  a 
heavy  burden  now  to  be  regarded  by  a  better  and 
a  wiser  humanity  as  the  greatest  and  most  longed- 
for  blessing  that  could  possibly  be  conferred  upon 
it? 

By  no  means.  The  right  to  labour  claimed 
by  the  workmen  of  Paris  was  a  bitter  protest 
against  the  cruel  caprice  of  the  mysterious  divini- 
ties who  every  now  and  then  suspended  operations 
and  condemned  thousands  of  industrious  workmen 
to  weeks  and  months  of  idleness  and  hunger. 
But  the  progress  of  the  human  race  towards 
wisdom  had  been  so  slight,  and  the  divinities 
they  worshipped  inspired  such  terror,  that  the 
Revolution  did  not  dare  to  command  them  to  be 
less  capricious ;  in  fact  it  was  soon  much  perplexed 
and  worried  by  all  the  demands  made  upon  it,  and 
above  all  by  the  new  and  strange  mania  of  men 
for  constant  work.  These  agitations  and  demands 
on  the  part  of  the  workmen  were  the  cause  of  the 


76  Problems  of  Peace 

first  discords  within  the  Provisional  Government 
and  the  first  anxieties  in  the  pubHc  mind. 

While  the  Revolution  was  parleying  with  so- 
cialism at  Paris,  in  Italy  and  Germany  it  broke, 
after  thirty-three  years,  the  peace  and  the  league 
of  the  dynasties.  In  Germany  the  Confederation, 
urged  by  public  opinion,  declared  war  on  Den- 
mark in  order  to  liberate  the  Duchy  of  Holstein, 
which  had  rebelled,  and  placed  the  King  of  Prussia 
in  control  of  the  conduct  of  the  war.  In  Italy  the 
people  which  the  Holy  Alliance  had  bound  liv- 
ing to  the  corpse  of  its  dead  past  suddenly  broke 
loose  and  attacked  the  Austrian  Empire.  The 
movement,  which  forced  Carlo  Alberto's  hand  in 
Piedmont,  had  been  more  political  than  nation- 
alist. When,  however,  it  became  known  at 
Turin  that  a  revolution  had  broken  out  at  Vienna, 
that  Venice  had  risen,  that  the  Austrian  Army, 
after  fighting  in  vain  for  five  days  against  the 
people,  had  evacuated  Milan  and  retired  into  the 
Quadrilateral,  that  the  senior  Austrian  Field- 
Marshal  with  all  his  military  science  and  all  his 
nimibers  had  been  beaten  by  the  sublime  im- 
petuosity of  an  insurgent  people  practically  with- 
out arms,  public  feeling  burst  forth  with  greater 
vehemence  than  ever  and,  having  secured  their 
constitution,  they  now  demanded  war  against  Aus- 


The  Revolution  of  1848  77 

tria.  LxDmbardy  must  at  once  be  invaded,  assist- 
ance given  immediately  at  Milan;  the  Austrians 
must  be  driven  from  Italy  and  the  whole  penin- 
sula freed  from  foreign  rule.  Fortune  had  provided 
an  opportunity  which  would  never  return!  The 
movement  of  public  opinion  was  so  violent  that 
on  March  27th  Carlo  Alberto  crossed  the  Ticino 
at  the  head  of  his  army  and  almost  all  the  States 
of  Italy,  including  the  Holy  See  and  the  Kingdom 
of  Naples,  compelled  by  the  sentiments  of  their 
peoples,  made  common  cause  with  Piedmont  by 
sending  soldiers  to  fight  against  the  Austrian 
Empire. 

The  Hapsburg  dynasty  was  therefore  caught 
between  the  two  fires  of  foreign  war  and  internal 
tumult.  In  the  month  of  April,  while  Carlo 
Alberto  was  victoriously  advancing  in  Lombardy 
and  Venetia  and  had  come  within  sight  of  the 
towers  of  the  fair  city  of  Verona  at  the  foot  of 
the  green  hills  which  line  the  banks  of  the  Adige, 
the  Emperor  Ferdinand  had  sanctioned  the  con- 
stitutional laws  passed  by  the  Hungarian  Diet, 
had  agreed  to  the  Bohemian  Charter,  which 
promised  that  the  Bohemian  provinces  should  be 
united  imder  a  government  responsible  to  the 
legislature,  had  confirmed  the  election  of  the  Ban 
of  Croatia  who  had  been  chosen  by  the  people,  and 


78  Problems  of  Peace 

finally,  on  April  25th,  had  granted  the  promised 
constitution. 

Two  days  earlier,  on  April  23d,  while  the 
Easter  bells  were  ringing,  Universal  Suffrage,  with 
a  composure  and  a  regularity  appropriate  to  a  long 
experience  of  sovereignty,  had  elected  in  France 
by  scrutin  de  lista,  and  without  any  disorder, 
the  National  Assembly  which  was  to  draw  up  the 
statutes  of  the  new  Republic.  By  comparison 
with  this  fulness  of  sovereignty  possessed  by  the 
French  people  the  Viennese  were  humiliated  by 
the  grudging  concessions  of  the  Emperor.  The 
new  constitution  did  not  provide  them  with  Uni- 
versal Suffrage,  and,  as  they  did  not  choose  to 
receive  freedom  and  sovereignty  as  a  gift,  they 
protested  violently  and  the  defective  constitution 
was  withdrawn.  In  Italy,  in  April  and  May, 
the  tide  of  Revolution  seemed  here  and  there  to 
recede  somewhat.  On  April  29th,  the  Pope  had 
declared  in  a  celebrated  Encyclical  that,  as  Father 
of  all  Catholics  alike,  he  could  not  make  war  on 
Austria,  and  in  May  the  Austrian  party  again 
raised  its  head  at  Naples.  The  King  dissolved 
Parliament  and  withdrew  his  contingent  from 
the  national  war.  Though  the  Hapsburgs  were 
making  terms  with  the  Revolution  in  their  own 
empire,  they  were  none  the  more  ready  to  renounce 


The  Revolution  of  1848  79 

the  satisfaction  of  stabbing  it  in  the  back  in  Italy, 
pending  the  time  when  they  could  meet  it  face  to 
face. 

The  transition  in  the  Itahan  States  from  fidelity 
to  Austria  to  war  and  revolution  had  been  too 
abrupt.  Austria  had  retained  too  many  under- 
standings, too  many  friendships,  too  many  parti- 
sans in  the  midst  of  these  enemies  of  a  day,  who 
for  so  many  years  had  been  her  clients.  Yet 
these  checks  were  small  in  comparison  with  the 
victories  which  the  Revolution,  to  all  appearance, 
continued  to  gain  everywhere.  On  the  fourth  of 
May,  the  National  Assembly  at  Paris  met  in  solemn 
session  at  the  Palais  Bourbon.  The  Provisional 
Government  was  dissolved  and,  pending  a  decision 
as  to  the  Presidency  of  the  Republic,  power  was 
entrusted  to  a  commission  of  five  to  appoint  a 
ministry.  On  May  i6th,  the  Emperor  of  Austria 
transferred  constituent  powers  to  a  Chamber  of 
303  deputies  elected  by  Universal  Suffrage.  On 
May  1 8th,  there  met  at  Frankfort  the  Germanic 
Parliament,  which  had  been  elected  by  Universal 
Suffrage  on  the  initiative  taken  in  March  by  the 
Heidelberg  Committee  and  in  accordance  with 
the  rules  laid  down  at  the  Frankfort  meeting 
which  supplanted  the  Diet  of  the  Confederation. 

The  Revolution,  however,  was  at  this  moment 


8o  Problems  of  Peace 

more  endangered  by  its  victories  than  by  its 
struggles.  Difficulties  began  not  where  it  was 
still  at  grips  with  an  unexhausted  or  even  an 
actually  more  powerful  enemy,  but  in  France, 
where  its  success  had  been  complete.  Universal 
Suffrage  had  not  been  dominated  by  prejudice  or 
rancour  or  by  any  form  of  exclusiveness  in  choosing 
the  members  of  the  Assembly.  It  had  been  de- 
sired that  men  of  eminence  in  every  branch  of 
human  knowledge  and  activity  should  form  part 
of  it,  that  all  ranks,  from  the  nobles  to  the 
peasants,  should  be  represented,  that  the  liberal 
professions,  the  clergy  no  less  than  commerce 
and  industry,  should  have  their  share.  Accord- 
ingly there  were  champions  of  all  parties  and 
of  every  doctrine,  from  Legitimism  to  Socialism. 
The  Socialists,  however,  were  very  few  in  number, 
and,  of  900  deputies,  about  450  were  former 
monarchists,  Legitimist  and  Orleanist,  while  the 
other  half  of  the  Chamber  included  many  republi- 
cans whose  opinions  were  only  two  months  old. 
Surprised  by  the  events  of  February  and  called 
upon  at  every  moment  to  discharge  the  responsi- 
bilities of  sovereignty,  Universal  Suffrage  seemed 
to  lose  confidence  in  itself  and  to  wish  to  restore 
the  ancient  principles  of  authority,  discredited 
and  defeated  though  they  were,  in  order  to  lean 


The  Revolution  of  1848  81 

on  them  for  support  and  countenance,  instead  of 
supplanting,  them  as  ruler  of  the  world. 

This  perplexity  on  the  part  of  the  new  sovereign 
authority  was  not  in  itself  surprising ;  it  is  easy  to 
explain,  but  it  was  the  beginning  of  a  very  danger- 
ous crisis.  The  partisans  of  the  old  forms  of 
government  were  delighted  and  took  courage, 
observing  with  justice  that  the  will  of  the  people, 
which  had  been  declared  by  the  Revolution  to  be 
sovereign  on  earth,  was  not  so  averse  to  their 
own  views  as  many  had  feared  would  be  the  case. 
On  the  other  hand  the  more  ardent  revolutionaries, 
the  advanced  republicans  and  the  Socialists,  were 
depressed.  They  asked  themselves  whether  Uni- 
versal Sioffrage,  which  had  been  crowned  by  the 
Revolution,  could  deny  its  master,  lie  to  the 
people,  and  threaten  the  Republic. 

Discord  and  suspicion  between  the  parties 
began,  and  grew  so  rapidly  that,  on  the  15th  of 
May,  eleven  days  after  the  meeting  of  the  Assem- 
bly, the  first  crisis  of  the  new  regime  broke  out. 
It  was  grave  in  itself  and  still  more  grave  in  view 
of  the  reason  or  pretext  which  gave  rise  to  it. 
On  March  6th,  Lamartine  had  obtained  the  Pro- 
visional Government's  approval  of  a  manifesto 
to  French  diplomatic  agents  in  which  it  was 
declared  that   the  new  Republic  threatened  no 


82  Problems  of  Peace 

power,  that  it  did  not  regard  monarchism  and 
republicanism  as  "absolute  principles  always 
at  war  with  each  other,"  that  "the  treaties  of 
1815  no  longer  existed  in  law  for  the  Republic,  but 
that  it  recognized  de  facto  the  territorial  delimi- 
tations laid  down  by  these  treaties."  This  subtle 
distinction  between  law  and  fact  was  intended  to 
reconcile  the  legitimate  anxiety  not  to  involve 
the  young  Republic  in  dangerous  and  dubious 
adventures  with  the  traditions  of  the  first 
Revolution  which  had  dared  to  defy  Europe  and 
had  called  upon  its  peoples  to  vindicate  their 
liberties. 

In  March  and  April,  however,  after  so  much  of 
Europe  had  taken  fire,  it  became  more  difiicult  for 
the  Government  to  reconcile  these  two  irreconcil- 
able positions.  Events  in  Italy  had  deeply  moved 
France — evoking  memories  of  the  Cisalpine  Re- 
public and  the  Kingdom  of  Italy,  and  of  the 
trophies  won  by  the  armies  of  the  First  Republic 
fighting  against  the  House  of  Austria  in  the  Valley 
of  the  Po.  At  the  same  time  the  national  sym- 
pathy with  Poland,  which  had  never  died  out,  was 
rekindled  most  of  all  in  the  parties,  chiefly  ad- 
vanced republican  and  socialist,  which  were  readi- 
est to  accuse  the  new  government  of  betraying  the 
Republic  and  the  Revolution,  and  were  demand- 


The  Revolution  of  1848  83 

ing  the  organization  of  laboiir  and  the  abolition 
of  poverty.  Their  revolutionary  tradition,  their 
hatred  of  tyranny  and  oppression,  their  desire  to 
embarrass  the  monarchical  parties,  which  were 
less  zealous  in  these  causes,  explain  the  fervour 
which  they  displayed. 

But  the  Government  were  in  the  position  that 
the  very  people  who  blamed  them  for  not  carrying 
out  a  social  revolution  were  urging  them  to  attempt 
intervention  in  international  affairs  which  would 
have  brought  about  a  war  of  the  first  magnitude. 
They  endeavoured  to  extricate  themselves  from 
this  dilemma  by  the  affirmation  of  general  prin- 
ciples.    It  was  true  that  France  should  put  her- 
self at  the  head  of  a  federation  of  free  peoples. 
The  treaties  of  18 15  were  dead.     But  it  was  not 
the  duty  of  France  to  revise  them  unaided,  and 
she  should  wait  for  a  European  conference  which 
would  meet  in  the  distant  future.     This  expedient 
lasted    until    May   15th,   when   a    procession   of 
workmen,  led  by  Blanqui,  came  to  present  a  peti- 
tion to  the  National  Assembly  in  favour  of  the 
unfortunate  Polish  nation  with  cries  of   Vive  la 
Pologne  !     Vive  la  Republique  !    The  procession  in- 
vaded the  Palais  Bourbon,  penetrated  into  the 
Chamber,  ordered  the  deputies  to  threaten  Aus- 
tria, Russia,  and  Prussia  with  war  if  they  did  not 


84  Problems  of  Peace 

immediately  deliver  Poland  from  her  chains,  and 
finally  declared  the  Assembly  dissolved ! 

After  a  few  hours  of  fisticuffs  and  vociferation  in 
the  Parliamentary  precincts  the  disturbance  was 
easily  and  bloodlessly  quelled,  since  the  National 
Guard  responded  at  once  to  the  summons  of  the 
Government  to  restore  order.  Yet  this  revolt  of 
the  people  of  Paris  against  Universal  Suffrage, 
which  three  months  before  they  had  themselves 
proclaimed  as  the  Sovereign  of  the  State  and  the 
source  of  legitimate  authority,  profoundly  dis- 
turbed both  France  and  her  new  Republic.  Many 
began  to  wonder  whether  the  people,  having  ac- 
quired the  right  to  command,  had  not  forgotten 
the  duty  to  obey.  And,  while  the  Assembly  on 
May  24th  declared  the  desirability  of  a  fraternal 
agreement  with  Germany,  the  independence  of 
Poland,  and  the  liberation  of  Italy,  the  revolt  of 
May  15th  discredited  the  doctrine  of  intervention 
with  all  parties  who  were  on  the  side  of  order,  and 
thus  countersigned  the  treaties  of  1 81 5  by  con- 
firming so  much  of  them  as  was  still  in  force. 

The  difficulties  of  the  situation  were  increased 
by  the  debates  of  the  Germanic  Parliament 
which,  as  we  have  seen,  met  on  May  i8th.  That 
Parliament  at  once  proclaimed  its  right  and  duty 
to  restore  the  Germanic  Empire.     After  having 


The  Revolution  of  1848  85 

in  vain  offered  the  crown  to  the  King  of  Prussia, 
the  title  of  Vicar  of  the  Empire  was  tendered 
to  the  Archduke  John,  the  most  popular  of  the 
Hapsburgs,  and,  as  its  ranks  were  packed  with 
conservatives  and  monarchists  rather  than  with 
radicals  and  revolutionaries,  it  soon  showed  great 
animosity  against  France  and  declared  that  Ger- 
man unity  should  embrace  on  the  one  hand  the 
Duchy  of  Posen  and  on  the  other  Trieste  and  even 
Venice ! 

While  in  France  Universal  Suffrage  was  offering 
Germany  brotherly  affection  and  was  demanding 
independence  for  Poland  and  freedom  for  Italy, 
Universal  Suffrage  in  Germany  replied  by  declar- 
ing its  hatred  for  France,  by  robbing  Poland  of 
Posen  and  Italy  of  Venice,  and  by  paying  court 
to  Prussia  and  Austria,  which,  though  in  different 
ways,  were  fighting  the  Revolution  with  equal 
determination.  The  Revolution  could  not  com- 
pose the  discords  of  Europe  if  those  who  wished  to 
tear  up  the  treaties  of  1815,  in  order  to  restore 
their  own  property  to  the  peoples  these  treaties 
had  despoiled,  also  wished  to  tear  them  up  in 
order  to  increase  their  own  booty.  This  was  a 
salutary  warning  to  France,  but,  absorbed  as  she 
was  in  her  own  internal  troubles,  she  could  not 
take  advantage  of  it.     The  heads  of  the  working 


86  Problems  of  Peace 

classes  had  been  turned  by  the  flatteries  of  which 
they  had  been  the  object  since  their  victory  in 
February,  by  the  promises  which  had  been  made 
to  them,  and  by  all  the  new  doctrines  of  the  day. 
At  the  same  time  they  had  been  impoverished  by 
the  disturbance  of  commerce  and  industry,  and 
this  aggravated  the  disappointment  of  many  ill- 
founded  hopes.     Revolutionary  agitators  there- 
fore broke  loose  from  books,  ceased  to  be  academic, 
and  harangued  the  workmen  in  the  squares  and 
streets  or  put  themselves  at  the  head  of  demon- 
strations demanding  the  abolition  of  competition 
and   usury,    the   nationalization    of    banks    and 
railways,  free  loans,  and  trades  unions,  the  right 
to  work,  a  Ministry  of  Progress.     Societies,  secret 
and  other,   were  very   active  among  the  people 
and  for  some   time  had  been  causing  suspicion 
and  anxiety  to  the  upper  and  middle  classes.     The 
disturbance  of  May  15th  had  increased  both  these 
feelings,  and  demands  began  to  be  heard  for  vigor- 
ous   counter-measures.     The    party   which    had 
founded  the  Republic,  and  which  was  now  to  give 
it  a  stable  form,  was  divided  into  two  groups  of 
which  one  was  inclined  to  a  reconciliation  with 
the  old  monarchist  parties  in  the  interests  of  order, 
while  the  other  wished  to  forgive  the  multitude 
its  impati(!nce  and  its  violence  in  order  that  the 


The  Revolution  of  1848  87 

Second  Republic  might  not  be  betrayed  like  the 
first. 

Rancour  and  party  spirit  complicated  the 
agitation,  and  embittered  and  intensified  these 
differences  of  opinion.  The  Bonapartist  faction, 
which  had  recovered  from  the  humiliation  which 
it  had  so  long  endured  under  the  two  preced- 
ing regimes,  took  a  leading  part  in  the  conflict, 
and  the  Socialists  became  the  object  of  an  im- 
placable animosity  on  the  part  of  the  upper  classes 
and  the  bourgeoisie.  On  their  side  the  Parisian 
working-class,  who  had  been  told  so  often  that 
they  were  the  authors  of  the  revolution  of  Febru- 
ary, were  offended  by  the  suspicions  of  their 
intentions  and  those  of  their  party  which  were 
felt  not  only  by  the  partisan  of  the  former  dis- 
credited governments  but  also  by  the  republicans 
of  recent  date.  They  were  embittered  by  the 
poverty  which  Universal  Suffrage  had  not  suc- 
ceeded in  abolishing,  by  the  disappointment  of  so 
many  of  their  hopes,  and  by  the  persecution  of 
their  leaders.  They  were  ready,  therefore,  to  lend 
an  ear  to  the  extremists,  to  the  hot-headed  fanatics 
of  revolution,  even  to  Socialist  and  Bonapartist 
intriguers,  who  kept  on  repeating  that  the  Revolu- 
tion had  been  betrayed  by  the  National  Assembly, 
that  the  people  of  Paris  who  had  founded  the  Re- 


88  Problems  of  Peace 

public  must  take  arms  again,  and,  in  fact,  that 
they  should  rebel  against  Universal  Suffrage.  The 
result  was  that  the  Parisian  proletariat  did  ac- 
tually rise  in  rebellion  on  June  23d  to  the  tragic 
cry,  '*Du  pain  ou  du  plomb  /  " 

No  impartial  vmXev  will  deny  the  Parisian 
workmen  of  1848  the  praise  which  courage, 
self-sacrifice,  sincerity,  and  an  ardent  desire  for 
good  deserve,  whenever  these  virtues  succeed  in 
piercing  the  hard  crust  of  the  earth  amid  the 
tangled  thicket  of  the  selfishness  and  the  evil 
passions  of  the  world.  These  humble  workmen 
had  felt  from  the  bottom  of  their  hearts  the  full 
force  of  the  tragedy  which  had  come  to  pass  in 
Europe  when  the  old  qualitative  civilization  had 
passed  away,  leaving  a  new^  quantitative  civil- 
ization in  its  place.  They  had  not  reached  the 
point  of  demanding  the  blessings  of  peace  and 
plenty,  but  were  ready  to  suffer  and  to  die  in  order 
that  the  world  might  be  purified  and,  in  the  abyss 
of  their  poverty,  they  were  moved  by  the  misfor- 
times  of  Poland  and  of  Italy.  They  belonged,  in 
fact,  to  that  part  of  the  human  race  whose  virtues 
compensate  for  the  vices  of  the  rest  and  entitle 
them  to  all  respect.  Seldom,  however,  have 
high-minded  men  so  tragically  shed  their  blood 
for  the  ruin  of  all  that  it  most  concerned  them  to 


The  Revolution  of  1848  89 

preserve.  This  time  the  Army  and  the  National 
Guard  showed  no  hesitation,  and  the  common 
danger  united  the  educated  and  the  middle  classes. 
Thus,  after  three  days  of  very  bitter  fighting,  the 
insurrection  was  quelled,  and  the  elan,  the  con- 
fidence, and  the  moral  force  of  the  Revolution 
which  had  seemed  destined  to  renovate  Europe 
from  Paris  were  shattered  for  ever. 

The  executive  commission  had  been  compelled 
to  resign  even  before  the  insurrection  was  over, 
and  General  Cavaignac,  the  Minister  of  War,  had 
been  made  Dictator  and  ruled  in  its  place  at  the 
head  of  the  Republic.  Four  months  after  it  had 
been  proclaimed  Sovereign  by  the  Revolution, 
Universal  Suffrage  had  yielded  up  its  powers, 
temporarily  it  is  true,  to  the  military  authorities 
for  fear  of  Revolution.  It  was  an  even  more  bit- 
ter disappointment  that,  after  this  insurrection, 
there  also  revived  among  the  upper  and  middle 
classes  all  the  old  terror  of  republicanism,  of 
Universal  Suffrage,  and  of  popular  sovereignty 
which  the  victories  and  the  sublime  principles  of 
the  Revolution  had  lulled  to  sleep  in  so  many 
minds.  France  was  once  more  tormented  by 
doubts  which  persisted  for  half  a  century  as  to 
whether,  after  all,  it  was  not  chimerical  to  seek 
any  other  sources  of  legitimate  authority  than 


90  Problems  of  Peace 

those  to  which  mankind  had  for  centuries  been 
accustomed.  Hence  arose  perplexities  and  hesi- 
tations, a  revival  of  courage  among  the  ancient 
enemies,  and  a  further  cooling  of  the  new  friends 
of  progress,  which  little  by  little  weakened  and  un- 
dermined the  Republic  until  they  finally  caused 
its  ruin. 

Many  historians  blame  the  bourgeoisie  and  the 
upper  classes  of  France  for  having  been  too  easily 
frightened  by  this  insurrection,  while  others  are 
inclined  to  suspect  that  their  terrors  were,  in  part 
at  least,  purposely  exaggerated.  But  the  recent 
disasters  in  Russia  show  that  there  was  good  rea- 
son for  alarm.  However  repugnant  it  may  be  to 
compare  the  vile  gang  of  which  Lenine  is  the  head 
to  the  high-minded  rebels  of  June,  1848,  it  is  none 
the  less  true  that  Lenine  and  his  followers  have 
accomplished  what  these  rebels  tried  in  vain  to  do 
— namely  the  forcible  overthrow  of  the  first  legal 
authorities  established  by  the  Revolution,  the 
Provisional  Government  and  the  Constituent 
Assembly,  whose  purpose  was  to  give  the  new 
regime  the  sanction  of  definitive  legality  and  to 
impress  upon  it  the  indelible  character  of  legitimate 
government.  What  would  have  happened  if  the 
insurgents  of  June  had  succeeded — as  Lenine  has 
done — in  striking  down  by  a  coup  de  main  every 


The  Revolution  of  1848  91 

principle  of  legality?  Would  not  France,  like 
Russia,  have  fallen  a  victim  to  force  which  has 
no  title  to  authority  beyond  itself  and  which  is 
compelled  to  sustain  itself  by  ever  growing  and 
ever  more  wicked  violence,  until  it  bleeds  itself 
to  death  or  is  suppressed  by  foreign  intervention  ? 
The  fiery  test  of  successful  revolution  has  always 
been  its  capacity  for  calling  a  halt  once  it  has 
overcome  the  old  principle  of  legality,  for  not 
acquiring  a  taste  for  the  game,  and  for  re-establish- 
ing order  as  soon  as  possible.  The  Revolution  of 
1848  failed  under  this  ordeal. 

This  was  a  great  misfortune,  for  the  terror 
aroused  in  France  by  the  second  civil  war,  which 
broke  out  four  months  after  the  first,  precipitated 
the  complete  ruin  of  the  Revolution,  and  by  this 
ruin,  as  we  shall  see,  Germany  alone  was  the 
gainer.  In  a  certain  sense  we  may  truly  say  that 
the  events  of  June  were  the  first  great  stroke  of 
luck  for  Germanism,  which  was  quietly  awaiting 
its  hour. 

All  these  consequences,  however,  were  not  ap- 
parent until  later.  For  the  moment  the  insur- 
rection of  June  inspired  the  parties  of  the  old 
regime  with  new  courage .  If  such  were  the  bloody 
fruits  of  liberty !  While  in  France  the  Revo- 
lution had  turned  its  own  weapons,  with  disastrous 


92  Problems  of  Peace 

restdts,  against  itself,  it  was  struck  down  in  Italy 
by  the  arms  of  its  enemies.  Marshal  Radetzky 
had  not  been  slow  to  profit  by  the  respite  afforded 
by  the  slow  progress  of  the  Piedmontese  forces 
to  summon  reinforcements  and  regroup  his  army. 
In  July,  after  reconquering  aU  Venetia  except 
Venice  itself,  he  moved  against  the  army  of  Carlo 
Alberto  with  overwhelming  forces  and  drove 
him  back,  step  by  step,  to  the  Ticino,  compel- 
ling the  King  to  conclude  an  armistice  on  Au- 
gust 9th,  whereby  he  undertook  to  recross  his 
frontiers. 

The  Revolution  had  thus  undergone  a  serious, 
but  not  an  irreparable,  defeat  in  Italy.  The 
Austrian  Empire,  in  fact,  notwithstanding  its 
Italian  successes,  seemed  every  day  in  greater 
danger.  The  Court  had  fled  to  Innsbruck,  and, 
when  Parliament  met  at  Vienna  on  July  226. 
with  the  powers  and  duties  of  a  Constituent 
Assembly,  perilous  difficulties  arose  with  Hungary. 
Hungary  regarded  Croatia  as  one  of  her  own 
provinces  and  refused  to  recognize  Jellachich  as 
Ban  or  any  act  of  the  National  Committee.  On 
the  other  hand  the  Austrian  Government  declined 
to  accept  the  views  of  Hungary  on  this  point. 
The  Hungarian  Parliament  retorted  in  July  by 
deciding    to   prepare    an    army.      It   was   there- 


The  Revolution  of  1848  93 

fore  to  be  expected  that  a  War  of  Secession 
would  soon  break  out  between  Austria  and 
Hungary. 

In  these  circumstances  prompt  assistance  from 
France  might  perhaps  have  saved  Italy.  Such 
assistance  was  in  fact  asked  for,  both  by  Carlo 
Alberto  and  by  deputations  from  the  Italian  cities, 
but  the  Government  of  General  Cavaignac  hesi- 
tated. One  party  in  the  Ministry  was  disposed  to 
help  Italy,  considering  that  the  time  had  come 
when  the  treaties  of  1815  should  be  finally  torn 
up.  Another  party  opposed  this  policy  from 
fear  of  the  consequences.  To  increase  the  per- 
plexity of  the  moment  England,  suspecting  that 
France  would  strengthen  herself  by  liberating 
Italy,  intervened  with  the  proposal  that  France 
and  England  should  jointly  interpose  as  mediators 
between  Austria  and  Piedmont,  though  the  course 
of  events  showed  clearly  that  what  was  required 
was  not  to  attempt  a  bargain  but  to  strike  a  final 
blow  at  the  wounded  giant  in  order  that  Italy 
might  be  free.  About  the  end  of  September  war 
broke  out  between  Austria  and  Himgary,  and  in 
October  the  Revolution  got  the  upper  hand  in 
Vienna.  The  populace,  which  was  on  the  side 
of  Hungary,  revolted  in  order  to  prevent  troops 
being  sent  to  fight  against  the  Hungarians.     The 


94  Problems  of  Peace 

Court  had  to  fly  to  Olmiitz,  while  the  rebels  re- 
mained in  possession  of  the  capital. 

If  in  the  autumn  of  1848,  a  French  army  had 
set  out  for  Piedmont  by  the  Valley  of  the  Po,  it  is 
not  easy  to  see  how  Austria  could  have  retained 
the  booty  she  had  secured  in  1815.  But  the 
French  Government,  weakened  by  the  grave 
internal  crisis,  and  doubtful  of  its  own  security, 
allowed  itself  in  the  end  to  be  overpersuaded  by 
England,  who  provided  an  excuse  for  avoiding  a 
dangerous  enterprise.  Thus  Austria  gained  time 
to  await  a  change  of  fortune,  and  was  once  more 
saved  by  the  precise  but  small-minded  calculations 
of  England  and  the  hesitations  of  France  where  the 
Revolution  had  now  begun  to  doubt  itself.  Its 
doubts  were  so  serious  that  the  National  Assembly 
decided  by  827  votes  against  130  that  the  Presi- 
dent of  the  Republic  should  be  elected  not  by 
itself,  but  by  Universal  Suffrage — so  strong  was 
the  desire  for  a  powerful  executive  force  which 
would  make  the  Republic  as  like  a  monarchy  as 
possible.  Universal  Suffrage  was  to  be  applied, 
like  a  miraculous  chrism  wherewith  to  anoint  as 
Head  of  the  State  a  Dictator,  a  half-sovereign,  a 
President  in  whom  the  multitude  might  recognize 
the  successor  of  their  ancient  monarchs. 

But  when  Revolution  stumbled  in  France  how 


The  Revolution  of  1848  95 

could  it  prevail  in  the  other  states  of  Europe? 
The  revival  of  the  parties  and  the  institutions  of 
the  old  regime  began  from  the  autumn  of  1848. 
At  Frankfort  the  Radical  party  attempted  a 
revolt  when  the  Parliament  approved  the  seven 
months'  armistice  concluded  by  the  King  of 
Prussia  with  Denmark,  denouncing  it  as  a  betrayal 
ot  ;;he  national  cause.  But  the  revolt  was  re- 
pressed not  without  bloodshed.  In  Austria  Gen- 
eral Windischgratz  marched  on  Vienna  with 
fifty  thousand  men,  and  after  a  bombardment, 
conquered  the  city.  Shortly  afterwards  the 
Emperor  Ferdinand  was  forced  by  the  absolutist 
party  to  abdicate,  as  being  too  weak  in  the  struggle 
against  Revolution.  He  was  succeeded  on  De- 
cember 2d  by  Francis  Joseph,  his  grandson,  a 
youth  of  eighteen  in  whose  hands  the  destinies 
of  Austria  were  condemned  to  remain  for  two 
generations. 

In  Italy  the  absolutist  and  Austrian  party  had 
raised  its  head  again  and  was  intriguing  with 
the  object  of  forcing  Piedmont  and  other  Italian 
Governments  compromised  by  the  Revolution  to 
conclude  a  shameftd  capitulation.  In  France, 
finally,  on  December  loth.  Universal  Suffrage 
elected  as  President  of  the  Republic  Louis  Na- 
poleon   Bonaparte,  son  of  Queen  Hortense.     Of 


96  Problems  of  Peace 

the  7,326,345  votes  cast,  5,434,226  were  for  this 
nephew  of  the  great  emperor,  i  ,448, 107  for  General 
Cavaignac,  the  few  remaining  ones  being  dispersed 
between  Ledru-Rollin,  Raspail,  and  Lamartine. 

The  meaning  of  this  election  was  clear  enough. 
While  the  Assembly  a  few  months  earlier  had 
entrusted  Universal  Suffrage  with  the  task  of 
arming  the  Republic  with  a  strong  executive 
power,  now  Universal  Suffrage  had  restored  the 
credit  of  the  old  legitimacy  and  had  turned  to  the 
last  of  the  former  systems  of  authority  which  still 
survived  unimpaired  by  the  civil  struggles  which 
the  existing  generation  still  remembered.  It  had 
selected  as  President  of  the  Republic  the  man 
who  in  all  France  most  resembled  a  monarch. 
The  hat  and  sword  of  Napoleon  had  been  taken 
out  of  the  museum,  and  Universal  Suffrage  hoped 
that,  concealed  behind  these  relics,  it  would  be 
better  obeyed. 

Shortly  afterwards,  in  March,  1849,  the  Frank- 
fort Parliament,  which  had  settled  the  imperial 
constitution  after  much  difficulty,  elected,  the 
King  of  Prussia  Emperor  of  Germany  by  290 
votes  against  248  abstentions.  In  Germany  also 
Universal  Suffrage  was  rallying  to  the  sword  and 
the  sceptre.  This  led  to  nothing,  however,  for 
Austria   recalled    her   representatives   from    the 


The  Revolution  of  1848  97 

Parliament  and  declared  it  dissolved.  Prussia, 
whose  King  declined  to  receive  even  an  imperial 
crown  from  the  hands  of  Universal  Suffrage, 
followed  Austria's  example,  and  invited  the 
German  States  to  send  their  representatives  to 
Berlin  to  study  a  new  constitution.  Everywhere 
the  party  of  Divine  Right  was  regaining  credit. 
In  Hungary  the  revolted  nation  in  arms  still 
held  out,  while  in  Italy  the  revolutionary  party 
despaired  of  French  assistance,  and  the  good  sense 
which  helps  only  those  who  are  not  altogether 
abandoned  by  fortune  gave  way  to  the  wrath 
which  will  rather  sacrifice  itself  without  hope  than 
admit  its  impotence  by  capitulation.  Towards 
the  end  of  1848,  terrified  by  the  violence  of  the 
nations  and  powerless  to  control  the  war  party, 
the  Pope  fled  from  Rome.  A  little  later  the 
Grand  Duke  of  Tuscany  fled  also.  A  Provisional 
Government  was  set  up  at  Florence  and,  after  some 
hesitation,  on  February  5,  1849,  a  Republic  was 
proclaimed  at  Rome. 

A  Republic  had  re-arisen  in  the  city  which  in  a 
distant  and  fabulous  past  had  been  first  the  tiny 
cradle  of  republicanism  and  afterwards  the  grandi- 
ose mausoleum  of  its  ruins!  Already  mortally 
wounded  in  its  duel  with  the  Austrian  Empire, 
the  Revolution  refused  to  surrender  in  Italy  and 


98  Problems  of  Peace 

gathered  its  forces  for  one  of  its  boldest  strokes. 
But  in  this  critical  determination  what  a  defiance 
to  the  whole  Catholic  world  was  implied!  As 
Massimo  d'Azeglio  afterwards  pointed  out,  the 
Pope  had  a  double  character.  For  the  Italians  he 
was  a  petty  sovereign  in  the  Peninsula,  a  hostage 
of  Austria;  for  foreigners  he  was  the  Vicar  of 
Christ  and  the  Head  of  the  Church.  If  in  Italian 
eyes  the  conquest  of  the  Holy  City  was  merely 
an  operation  in  a  war  against  clericalism,  it  was 
for  other  peoples  a  mortal  affront  to  the  Catholic 
Faith.  No  human  power,  then  or  afterwards, 
could  clear  up  this  tragic  misunderstanding 
between  Italy  and  the  Catholic  world.  No 
sooner  was  the  Republic  proclaimed  at  Rome 
than  a  new  enemy  took  the  field  against  the 
Italian  Revolution  already  at  grips  with  Austria, 
and  this  enemy  was  none  other  than  France 
herself. 

France  which,  only  a  year  previously,  had  risen 
to  break  the  chains  of  the  world,  which  in  the 
Autumn  of  1848  had  deliberated  whether  to  send 
an  expedition  to  the  help  of  Italy,  in  1849  sent  a 
force  to  compel  her  younger  sister  the  Roman 
Republic  to  restore  her  precious  conquest  to 
the  Pope!  The  conservative  classes,  including 
the  French  party  which  remained  faithful  to  the 


The  Revolution  of  1848  99 

Church,  owing  to  their  birth  and  social  position, 
had  much  influence  with  the  new  President.  The 
principles  of  traditional  authority  had  now  recov- 
ered their  credit  with  the  more  influential  classes 
which  had  been  impoverished  by  the  Revolution, 
and  they  were  inclined  to  support  the  institutions 
which  had  been  their  historic  organs.  It  is  easy 
to  understand  why  Louis  Napoleon  wished  to 
forbid  the  Revolution  taking  possession  of  the 
Holy  City. 

France  was  not  alone.  Another  power,  Russia, 
soon  intervened.  Though  all  Europe  had  vacil- 
lated, Nicholas  I.  had  stood  firm.  He  had  con- 
demned Carlo  Alberto  as  a  traitor  and  had 
disbanded  the  regiment  known  by  his  name.  He 
had  also  shown  some  resentment  against  the  King 
of  Prussia  for  his  weakness.  Francis  Joseph,  who 
had  ascended  the  throne  of  the  Hapsbiu-gs  with 
the  determination  to  restore  absolutism,  asked 
and  obtained  the  aid  of  Russia  against  the 
Revolution.  Nicholas  I.  did  a  thing  which  is 
almost  unique  in  European  history:  merely  be- 
cause of  dynastic  and  political  solidarity,  when  no 
other  interest  was  involved,  he  sent  a  large  army 
against  the  Hungarians  and  definitely  saved 
Austria.  The  hopes  which  the  Italian  Revolution 
had  of  Hungary  were  also  dashed  to  the  ground. 


100  Problems  of  Peace 

How  could  Italy  and  Hungary  conquer  France, 
Austria,  and  Russia?     What  remained  but  to  die? 

Destiny  fulfilled  itself.  On  March  21,  1849, 
Carlo  Alberto  broke  the  armistice  because  he 
had  lost  all  hope  of  victory.  The  war  was 
short.  On  March  23d  the  Piedmontese  army 
was  overcome  at  Novara  by  overwhelming  forces 
and  the  same  evening  Carlo  Alberto  abdicated. 
Once  more  force  had  triumphed.  After  the  fall 
of  Piedmont  neither  Sicily  nor  Venice  nor  the 
Roman  Republic  could  continue  the  fight.  In  the 
second  half  of  1849  Italy  seemed  to  have  returned 
to  the  condition  from  which  she  had  striven  to  rise 
at  the  beginning  of  1848.  It  was  as  if  the  univer- 
sal Revolution  had  come  to  nothing. 

Nor  was  this  the  case  in  Italy  alone.  In  Ger- 
many the  declarations  of  Austria  and  Prussia 
that  the  Frankfort  Parliament  was  dissolved 
had  given  rise  to  grave  disturbances,  particularly 
at  Dresden,  in  Bavaria,  and  in  Baden.  These  out- 
breaks, however,  were  quelled,  and  the  Parlia- 
ment, which  had  been  reduced  to  a  handful  of 
members  by  the  departure  of  the  Austrians  and 
the  Prussians.was  compelled  to  retire  to  Stuttgart, 
where,  on  June  18,  1849,  it  was  dispersed  by  the 
soldiers  of  the  King  of  Wurttemberg. 

In  Austria,  as  early  as  March,  when  the  issue 


The  Revolution  of  1848  loi 

of  the  war  both  in  Hungary  and  Italy  was  still 
doubtful,  the  young  Emperor  had  been  bold  enough 
to  dissolve  the  Constituent  Parliament,  granting 
as  a  compensation  the  so-called  constitution  of 
March.  But,  after  the  reconquest  of  Venice  and 
Lombardy,  and  after  Hungary  had  been  subdued 
with  the  help  of  Russia's  absolutism,  he  gradually 
withdrew  the  concessions  which  had  been  made 
until,  on  December  31, 1850,  the  instrument  known 
as  the  Patent  of  S.  Silvester  revoked  even  the 
constitution  of  March.  The  King  of  Prussia  did 
not  perjure  himself  so  openly  as  the  Emperor  of 
Austria  had  done.  He  and  his  government,  by 
patient  manceuvring  during  1849  or  1850,  found 
means  to  induce  the  first  Parliament  elected  by 
Universal  Suffrage  to  pass  the  constitution  which 
is  still  in  force  in  Prussia.  That  constitution  by 
means  of  its  Parliament  provides  an  oratorical 
safety  valve  for  the  educated  bourgeoisie;  but  a 
complicated  system  of  franchise  on  a  timocratic 
basis  secures  the  privileges  of  the  Crown  and  of  the 
aristocracy,  and  keeps  the  government  of  the  State 
in  the  hands  of  the  dynasty  and  of  the  nobility. 
In  1 85 1,  after  many  struggles  and  negotiations 
between  Austria,  Prussia,  and  the  other  German 
States,  the  old  Diet  of  the  Germanic  Confederation 
was  finally  restored. 


102  Problems  of  Peace 

While  in  Italy  Revolution  had  been  conquered 
by  foreign  intervention,  and  in  Austria  by  the 
Court  and  the  Army,  in  Prussia  it  had  been  evaded. 
In  France,  on  the  other  hand,  it  committed  suicide. 
In  the  course  of  two  years  the  National  Assembly 
and  the  Government  of  the  Republic  abdicated 
their  authority,  not  merely  by  the  contradictions, 
the  hesitancy,  and  the  impotence  which  they 
displayed,  but  also  by  their  persistent  suspicion  of 
Universal  Suffrage  and  their  constant  attempts  to 
restrict  the  application  of  the  principle  by  sur- 
reptitious expedients.  The  nation  lost  patience; 
the  adversaries  of  Universal  Suffrage  were  not  idle; 
its  supporters  were  incensed.  Among  the  people 
there  was  a  great  increase  in  the  number  of  open 
and  secret  societies,  and  a  hope  spread  that  in 
1852  there  would  be  great  changes  in  the  world. 

The  upper  classes  demanded  a  government 
whose  indisputable  title  to  authority  should  be 
force,  though  it  was  not  easy  to  see  how  their 
desire  could  be  satisfied  in  the  midst  of  the  in- 
numerable quarrels  of  the  upper  classes  themselves 
and  the  implacable  conflict  of  so  many  political 
views  and  principles  of  authority.  To  the  melee 
of  legitimists,  Orleanists,  and  the  republicans  were 
now  added  the  socialists  and  the  Bonapartists, 
the  last-named  being  emboldened  by  the  circum- 


The  Revolution  of  1848  103 

stance  that  a  Bonaparte  was  once  more  at  the 
head  of  the  Republic.  Many  were  beginning  to 
despair  when  Louis  Napoleon  found  a  means  of  his 
own,  which  was  at  once  bold  and  specious,  for 
deahng  with  the  apparently  insoluble  problem. 
He  took  advantage  of  the  universal  discontent 
and  the  anxieties  of  the  upper  classes  to  dissolve 
the  Assembly  and  assume  the  Dictatorship.  He 
re-established  Universal  Suffrage  on  December 
20th ,  adding  a  plebiscite  in  the  following  terms : 

Le  peuple  veutle  tnaintien  deVautorite  de  Louis  Na- 
poleon Bonaparte,  et  lui  delegue  le  pouvoir  necessaire 
pour  faire  une  constitution  sur  les  bases  proposees  par 
la  proclamation  du  2  Decembre. 

In  that  proclamation  he  announced  his  intention 
of  restoring ' '  the  government  of  the  first  consulate" 
with  a  responsible  Head  elected  for  ten  years, 
Ministers  dependent  on  the  executive,  a  Council  of 
State  which  would  prepare  legislation  and  present 
it  to  the  Corps  Legislatif ,  which,  in  its  turn,  would 
be  elected  by  Universal  Suffrage,  and  would  debate 
and  pass  laws.  There  was  to  be  a  Second  Chamber 
composed  of  the  most  eminent  men  in  France, 
who  would  be  responsible  for  the  observance  of 
the  constitution  and  the  maintenance  of  liberty. 
What  else  was  this  constitution  than  a  prison  in 


I04  Problems  of  Peace 

which  Universal  Suffrage  was  to  be  held  in  bondage 
by  a  President  invested  with  the  powers  of  a 
dictator?  And  yet  7,439,216  citizens  voted  for  it 
and  only  640,737  against  it.  Universal  Suffrage, 
after  governing  France  for  three  years,  had  sur- 
rendered itself  a  prisoner  to  a  Bonaparte.  The 
promised  constitution  was  hastily  drawn  up  and 
Louis  Napoleon  seized  all  the  sovereign  powers 
for  himself,  leaving  to  Universal  Suffrage  only  the 
right  to  elect  the  Corps  Legislatif ,  which  could  only 
pass  such  measures  as  were  proposed  to  it  by  the 
Council  of  State.  It  had  no  right  to  insist  on 
amendments  which  the  Council  of  State  rejected, 
to  nominate  its  own  President,  or  even  to  question 
Ministers,  who,  being  responsible  to  the  President 
of  the  Republic,  could  not  appear  before  the  Corps 
Legislatif.  A  decree  of  February  17,  1852,  which 
abolished  the  liberty  of  the  press,  completed  the 
work. 

Thus,  at  the  beginning  of  1852,  the  history  of  the 
Revolution  might  well  suggest  to  the  contemporary 
spectator  the  brief  splendour  of  an  Aurora  BoreaHs 
which  had  flamed  across  the  firmament  of  Europe 
but  whose  passing  glories  were  now  drowned  in  a 
night  which  was  darker  than  ever.  The  peoples 
whom  it  had  incited  to  recover  their  national 
independence— Bohemia,   Hungary,   and   Italy— 


The  Revolution  of  1848  105 

were  all  once  more  in  chains.  What  had  been  the 
result  of  its  attempt  to  crown  the  Will  of  the  People 
sovereign  of  the  world?  A  timid  constitution  in 
Piedmont,  an  equivocal  and  insincere  constitution 
in  Prussia,  a  republican  dictatorship  in  France,  less 
oligarchical  perhaps,  but  more  despotic  than  the 
monarchy  of  Louis  Philippe.  Even  this,  towards 
the  end  of  1853,  was  changed  into  an  empire  when 
Louis  Napoleon  assumed  the  imperial  crown  with 
the  style  of  Napoleon  III.  France  had  turned  her 
back,  alike  on  legitimate  monarchy  and  on  the 
principles  of  1848,  and  was  seeking  the  principle 
of  authority  in  the  tradition  of  the  Empire  whose 
titles  to  government  were  not  principles  or  parch- 
ment deeds  but  genius,  glory,  and  good  fortune. 

All  this,  however,  was  not  reality  but  mere 
appearance.  The  great  change  had  in  fact  come, 
and  from  it  derives  the  whole  history  of  Europe 
until  the  outbreak  of  the  world  war. 


CHAPTER  V 

THE    GREAT    SURPRISE.       THE    GERMANIC    TRIUMPH 

( 1 848-1870) 

The  Revolution  of  1848  seemed  at  the  time  to 
have  failed  in  every  country  in  which  it  had  broken 
out,  yet  it  did  achieve  a  few  partial  successes.  In 
the  first  place,  it  split  the  d3^nasties  of  Europe  in- 
to two  groups,  those  which  had  bargained  with 
Revolution,  that  is,  Prussia  and  Piedmont,  and 
those  which  had  stood  fast — Russia,  Austria, 
and  the  Italian  States  apart  from  Piedmont. 
Secondly,  it  set  up  between  these  two  groups  of 
legitimate  dynasties  the  d3masty  of  the  Napo- 
leonidae  which  suddenly  reappeared  on  the  debris 
of  18 1 5,  a  creature  of  the  Revolution  and  an  in- 
truder in  the  august  family  of  sovereigns  by  the 
Grace  of  God.  While  not  openly  at  war,  the  two 
legitimate  groups  began  to  distrust  each  other, 
and  the  new  Napoleon  who  had  been  crowned  at 
Paris  was  viewed  with  anxiety  and  suspicion  by 
both.  The  King  of  Prussia  called  him  "the 
crowned  adventurer,"  and  accused  him  of  having  a 

106 


The  Germanic  Triumph  107 

secret  understanding  with  Kossuth  and  Mazzini 
for  carrying  fire  and  sword  into  the  four  comers  of 
Europe.  In  his  letters  Nicholas  I.  did  not  address 
him  as  "Brother,  "  as  he  did  other  sovereigns,  and 
when  Napoleon  III.  remonstrated,  excused  himself 
by  the  remark  that  brothers  were  given  by  God, 
whereas  a  man  chose  his  friends  for  himself! 
Though  Europe  had  been  freed  from  none  of  the 
tyrannies,  real  or  imaginary,  which  the  contem- 
porary generation  hated  and  wished  to  slay,  the 
conspiracy  of  the  Courts  to  impose  absolutism  on 
the  peoples  was  broken,  and  the  first  league  of 
European  states  had  been  dissolved. 

How  and  why  this  happened  is  now  clear.  The 
first  European  peace  league  failed  because  the 
doctrine  of  Divine  Right  and  legitimacy  had  for 
the  greater  part  of  the  continent  ceased  to  be  any- 
thing but  an  imposture  practised  by  interested 
parties.  It  failed  because  it  had  ruthlessly  sacri- 
ficed several  peoples,  among  others  Italy,  the  first- 
bom  of  European  civilization.  It  failed,  finally, 
because  it  had  refused  to  recognize  any  of  the 
legitimate  ambitions  and  aspirations  of  the  middle 
class.  But,  once  the  concord  of  Courts  was  broken, 
great  cracks  and  crevices  opened  in  the  crust  which 
for  thirty  years  had  contained  the  fiery  mass  which 
since  the  Revolution  and  the  Empire  had  been 


io8  Problems  of  Peace 

boiling  in  the  heart  of  the  European  polity. 
Tongues  of  flame,  geysers,  jets  of  lava,  and  burning 
ashes  began  to  shoot  forth  from  these  cracks  and 
crevices,  opening  and  enlarging  the  way  for  a  more 
violent  eruption,  until  finally  the  outburst  came 
which  lasted  for  four  years  and  threatened  to  bury 
the  civilization  of  Europe  under  a  winding  sheet 
of  ashes  like  an  immense  Pompeii.  The  first  gust 
of  flame  which  lashed  Europe  was  a  war  about 
Eastern  affairs. 

The  responsible  author  of  this  war  was  no  other 
than  the  Head  of  the  Holy  Alliance,  Nicholas  I., 
so  great  was  the  power  of  the  Revolution  of  1848 
over  those  who  hated  it  the  most !  It  appears  that 
Nicholas  had  cherished  all  his  life  a  great  ambition 
to  conquer  Constantinople  and  to  annihilate 
Turkey.  However,  so  long  as  the  crowTied  heads 
of  Europe  had  lived  in  unity  and  concord  like  a 
large  family  he  had  scrupled  to  disturb  this  happy 
state  of  affairs  by  his  ambitious  plans.  He  had, 
therefore,  resisted  the  temptation  until  the  Revolu- 
tion of  1848  seemed  to  offer  a  favourable  oppor- 
tunity of  accompHshing  his  schemes  of  conquest 
with  the  acquiescence  and  complicity  of  Europe. 
From  Austria,  whom  he  had  saved  and  whose 
youthful  sovereign  had  humbly  kissed  his  hand, 
Nicholas  I.  believed  himself  to  be  safe.     He  was 


The  Germanic  Triumph  109 

still  all  powerful  in  the  German  Courts,  notwith- 
standing a  certain  coolness  with  the  King  of 
Prussia.  In  England  his  old  friend,  Lord  Aberdeen, 
who  was  faithful  to  the  traditions  of  the  Holy- 
Alliance,  was  in  office.  What  could  France  have 
done  alone  ?  That  England  and  France,  now  that 
a  member  of  the  dynasty  of  Napoleon  had  assumed 
the  crown,  could  unite  against  Russia  appeared 
to  him  impossible  and  he  said  so  to  several  people. 
These  delusive  calculations  appear  to  have  in- 
duced Nicholas  to  raise  in  the  first  place  a  ques- 
tion about  the  Holy  Places  and  then  to  enlarge  his 
pretensions  by  degrees  until  he  actually  claimed 
from  Tiu-key  a  protectorate  over  all  Greeks  who 
were  subjects  of  the  Ottoman  Empire.  At  this 
point,  however,  that  which  according  to  Nicholas 
was  impossible  happened,  and  France  and  England 
joined  hands.  Although  neither  of  these  Powers 
wished  to  undertake  a  war  Nicholas's  enterprise 
endangered  so  many  interests  which  they  had  in 
common  that  the  former  rivals  were  gradually  led 
to  make  a  joint  effort  to  persuade  Russia  both  by 
arguments  and  threats  to  desist.  When  the  Czar 
saw  that  France  and  England  presented  a  united 
front  he  hesitated,  but  he  was  no  longer  able  to 
control  events.  Turkey  had  grasped  the  fact  that 
the  old  agreement  of  the  European  Courts  was 


no  Problems  of  Peace 

broken  and  that  an  opportunity  had  presented 
itsdf  of  making  war  with  Russia  with  the  blood 
and  treasure  of  France  and  England  which  would 
not  soon  occur  again.  She  therefore  manoeuvred 
so  skilfully  that  all  approaches  to  agreement  failed 
when  they  were  on  the  point  of  succeeding,  and 
France  and  England  took  the  field  in  her  defence. 
The  Crimean  War,  after  the  Italian  war  of  1848, 
takes  the  second  place  in  the  new  series  of  con- 
flicts beginning  in  1848,  the  war  in  Hungary  being 
rather  of  the  nature  of  a  civil  struggle,  while  the 
war  for  Holstein  between  the  Germanic  Con- 
federation and  Denmark  was  little  more  than  a 
skirmish.  The  cause  of  the  Crimean  War  was  the 
determination  to  prevent  Russia  from  aggrandiz- 
ing herself  too  much  in  the  East  to  the  prejudice 
of  Turkey.  England  and  France  were  not  alone  in 
allying  themselves  with  Turkey  to  bar  Russia's 
way  to  Constantinople.  They  were  joined  by 
Piedmont — the  small  State  which  had  first  dared 
to  break  the  peace  of  the  sovereigns  by  defying  the 
Hapsburgs  in  1848.  She  now  asked,  as  an  honour, 
to  be  allowed  to  offer  her  soldiers,  though  she  had  no 
interests  in  the  East  and  should  have  been  more 
concerned  with  her  own  uncertain  and  precarious 
destinies  than  with  the  fate  of  Constantinople. 
This  intervention,  which  seemed  madness  to  many 


The  Germanic  Triumph  iii 

contemporaries,  but  which  was  part  of  the  deep- 
laid  plan  of  a  profound  and  subtle  diplomatist 
exalted  by  a  mighty  ambition,  is  the  clearest  proof 
of  the  internal  revolution  which  had  taken  place 
in  1848,  in  spite  of  the  apparently  unaltered  aspect 
of  many  things  which,  after  a  brief  period  of  per- 
turbation, had  returned  to  their  old  form  and  shape. 

Piedmont  had,  indeed,  been  beaten  and  confined 
by  Austria  within  her  old  boundaries,  but  she  had 
not  been  reduced  to  the  old  subject  status  as  a 
client  and  protected  country,  like  the  other  govern- 
ments of  Italy.  These  governments,  once  more 
persuaded  of  their  invincibility,  thanks  to  the 
support  of  Austria  now  victorious  over  the  Revolu- 
tion, had  recommenced  their  evil  practices  and 
were  behaving  worse  than  ever.  Except  in  Tus- 
cany, liberalism  and  nationalism  were  persecuted. 
Obsequious  servility  to  themselves,  to  the  Church, 
and  to  their  powerful  protector  was  enforced  by 
corruption  and  terrorism.  Every  impediment 
which  suspicion  could  devise  was  placed  in  the 
way  of  the  nation's  studying,  enriching  itself, 
working,  or  copying  the  innovations  with  which 
England,  France,  and  Germany  were  experiment- 
ing in  trade  and  industry. 

Once  more  Italy  had  been  bound  to  the  corpse 
of  her  own  past  and  once  more  there  commenced 


112  Problems  of  Peace 

a  series  of  clandestine  agitations,  secret  societies, 
conspiracies,  and  risings.  In  the  Kingdom  of 
Piedmont,  on  the  other  hand,  owing  to  the  grant 
of  the  Constitution,  the  war  against  Austria,  the  ab- 
dication of  Carlo  Alberto,  a  definitive  change  had 
taken  place  between  1848  and  1849.  The  greater 
part  of  the  aristocracy  who  had  been  faithful 
servants  of  absolutism  under  the  three  Kings  of  the 
Restoration  and  who  had  followed  Carlo  Alberto 
in  his  warlike  adventure  more  from  obedience  than 
conviction,  had  retired  to  their  Estates.  The  new 
King,  Victor  Emanuel  11. ,  had  clearly  understood 
that  the  old  order  had  gone  for  ever  in  Piedmont 
and  had  set  himself  to  govern  with  parliamentary 
institutions,  that  is  to  say,  with  the  help  of  the 
educated  middle  class  and  of  such  of  the  nobility 
as  did  not  wish  to  separate  themselves  from  the 
new  age,  and,  so  far  as  was  possible,  in  the  spirit 
and  with  the  aims  of  the  Revolution  of  1848,  which 
was  to  a  great  extent  the  work  of  the  bourgeoisie. 
In  a  few  years  Piedmont  became  unrecognizable 
by  comparison  with  the  other  States  of  Italy,  In 
them  absolutism  ruled  with  the  support  of  the 
aristocracy  while  in  Piedmont  the  King  governed 
according  to  the  Constitution ;  bourgeois  and  aris- 
tocrat, distinguished  only  by  an  empty  title,  were 
mingled  in  Parliament  and  in  office;  the  press  was 


The  Germanic  Triumph  113 

free.  In  the  rest  of  Italy  the  State  did  everything 
in  its  power  to  cherish  the  Church  and  enforce  re- 
spect for  it.  In  Piedmont  every  opportunity  of 
quarrelling  with  Rome  was  seized,  in  order  to  give 
vent  to  the  feelings  of  anger  and  rancour  of  the 
liberal  parties  and  the  new  classes  which  had  been 
taken  into  the  government.  In  the  rest  of  Italy 
every  new  piece  of  industrial  machinery,  every  |new 
invention  of  science,  every  new  teaching  of  philo- 
sophy, was  regarded  with  suspicion,  whereas  in 
Piedmont  nothing  was  neglected  which  could 
conduce  to  the  economic  and  scientific  progress  of 
the  world.  The  other  States  of  Italy  were  faithful 
satellites  of  Austria,  but  the  new  Piedmontese 
Government  scarcely  hid  under  a  show  of  courte- 
ous independence  its  aversion  to  the  Empire  by 
which  it  had  been  humiliated  at  Novara.  The 
Hapsburgs  had  been  able  to  reconquer  Milan, 
Venice,  and  the  hegemony  of  Italy;  but  in  Pied- 
mont they  had  lost  for  ever  the  small  but  precious 
ally  who  from  18 15  to  1848  had  barred  the  Western 
Alps  to  France. 

In  short,  in  the  tempestuous  years  1848  and 
1849,  the  Italian  Question,  which  had  hitherto 
been  nebulous  and  confused,  had  taken  the  vivid 
and  definite  form  of  a  great  civil  war,  latent 
throughout  the  peninsula  between  two  parties, 


114  Problems  of  Peace 

one  of  which  wished  to  preserve  the  order  of  things 
established  by  the  Congress  of  Vienna,  the  respect 
for  Divine  Right,  absolute  government,  and  aris- 
tocratic privilege,  which  was  opposed  to  all  the 
novelties  of  the  century  and  particularly  to  the 
progress  which  the  Liberals  admired  so  much,  while 
the  other  longed  for  representative  institutions, 
the  abolition  of  aristocratic  privileges,  the  humilia- 
tion of  the  Church,  and  the  introduction  into  the 
cities  of  that  confused  cult  of  progress  and  Fire 
which  led  men  to  worship  the  machines  made  by 
their  hands.  The  first  of  these  two  parties  leaned 
for  support  on  Austria,  and  as  Austria  from  the 
Valley  of  the  Po  held  the  whole  peninsula  in  the 
hollow  of  her  hand,  her  predominance  was  not  to 
be  gainsaid.  The  second  party  ruled  Piedmont 
and  was  the  hope  of  all  those  who  were  oppressed 
by  the  dominant  party  in  the  other  States.  Re- 
fugees from  all  parts  of  Italy  now  fled  in  thousands 
to  Turin.  How  could  this  civil  war  latent  in  the 
breast  of  Italy  be  decided  except  by  a  new  war 
between  Piedmont  and  Austria?  And  what  would 
become  of  the  little  State  if  at  the  terrible  moment 
in  which  she  must  again  confront  the  giant  she 
lacked  a  strong  ally  ? 

Thus  the  war  in  the  East  seemed  to  Cavour  and 
to  Victor  Emanuel  a  favourable  opportunity  of  ad- 


The  Germanic  Triumph  115 

vertising  themselves  in  the  midst  of  the  reviving 
discords  of  the  Great  Powers.  In  these  discords 
lay  Italy's  only  hope  of  emerging  from  her  present 
misery  into  a  better  life.  Russia  had  saved  Aus- 
tria in  1849  by  intervening  m  Hungary  and  thus 
completing  the  ruin  of  Piedmont.  Russia,  like 
Austria,  was  an  absolute  monarchy,  and  Nicholas 
I.  was  the  champion  of  Divine  Right  who  had 
declared  Carlo  Alberto  to  be  a  felon  for  granting  a 
constitution.  The  choice  was  soon  made.  The 
nobility  and  the  remains  of  the  old  conservative 
party  tenaciously  opposed  the  intervention  of 
Piedmont,  and  quite  rightly  from  their  point  of 
view,  for  the  Crimean  War  was  the  grave  of  the 
Holy  Alliance.  Not  only  did  the  death  of  Nicholas 
I., which  took  place  during  the  campaign,  deprive 
the  absolutist  party  of  its  most  authoritative  head, 
but  his  son  and  successor,  Alexander  II.,  was  a  man 
of  a  different  temperament  and  different  inclina- 
tions. Under  the  new  Czar  in  the  Russian  Court 
and  Government  the  feeling  of  solidarity  with  the 
dynasties  which  had  remained  faithful  to  absolut- 
ism was  overcome  by  a  bitter  resentment  against 
the  Hapsburg  Monarchy  which  had  repaid  Russia 
for  her  help  in  Hungary  by  observing  during  the 
Crimean  War  a  suspicious  and  at  times  a  malevo- 
lent neutrality. 


ii6  Problems  of  Peace 

The  Crimean  War  estranged  Russia  and  Austria, 
the  two  empires  which  should  have  sustained  in 
Europe  the  doctrines  and  the  traditions  of  the  Holy 
Alliance,  and,  after  that  estrangement,  what  re- 
mained of  the  old  league  of  monarchs?  Europe 
was  now  emancipated  from  its  control  and  mistress 
of  her  own  fate,  of  her  discords,  rivalries,  and 
ambitions  open  or  secret.  England  again  retired 
into  her  shell  to  prosecute  her  ever-growing  com- 
mercial successes  and  regarded  Continental  affairs 
strictly  from  the  point  of  view  of  profit  and  loss, 
Russia  retired  into  her  immense  spaces  to  recover 
from  the  wounds  made  by  the  war,  to  brood  over 
her  resentment  against  Austria,  and  to  prepare  for 
the  great  reforms  which  were  to  abolish  servitude 
and  to  open  the  way  for  the  middle  classes  to  higher 
education  and  public  office.  Austria  was  watching 
on  the  outskirts  of  her  empire  her  enemies,  who  had 
been  beaten  but  not  subdued.  Prussia  continued 
to  administer  her  scattered  territories  with  zealous 
energy  and  to  dream  her  turbid  dreams  of  power 
and  glory  while  she  put  her  new  constitution  into 
operation. 

There  remained  France.  In  the  midst  of  the 
reviving  discord  of  the  Powers,  when  each  was 
somewhat  surprised  and  rather  dtsoriente  at  being 
left  alone  after  so  many  years  of  mutual  support, 


The  Germanic  Triumph  117 

France  found  herself  less  constrained,  freer  in  her 
movements,  and  in  a  position-  to  exercise  a  certain 
authority.  Had  not  the  long  agreement  o£  the 
Courts  perhaps  been  arranged  for  the  special 
purpose  of  preventing  France  from  moving  and 
agitating  too  much?  Once  the  chain  was  broken 
France  no  longer  found  all  Europe  tmited  against 
her,  by  a  common  suspicion  if  not  by  a  common 
hatred  of  herself,  but  a  series  of  States  each  domi- 
nated by  its  own  passions  and  interests,  among 
whom,  thanks  to  her  prestige  and  her  resources, 
she  could,  at  least  to  a  certain  extent,  take  the 
lead. 

After  the  Crimean  War,  in  fact,  partly  owing  to 
his  name,  partly  to  the  victory  of  the  French  arms, 
partly  to  the  reserve  or  remissness  of  all  the  other 
Powers,  Napoleon  III.  enjoyed  a  very  special  au- 
thority in  Europe.  The  alliance  with  England 
had  been  followed  by  a  cordial  friendship  between 
the  two  nations.  Russia  from  resentment  against 
Austria  tried  to  make  friends  with  France.  Even 
between  France  and  Prussia  there  were  good  rela- 
tions. The  King  of  Sardinia  cultivated  with 
growing  zeal  the  friendship  of  the  new  Empire  in 
the  Italian  Peninsula.  France  might  therefore 
have  acquired  in  Europe  a  moderating  and  regu- 
lating authority  not  unlike  a  real  primacy — but 


ii8  Problems  of  Peace 

on  one  condition,  namely,  that  the  nation  was  in 
agreement  as  to  the  policy  to  be  followed  and 
prepared  to  undergo  the  necessary  sacrifices,  and 
that  the  government  should  pursue  that  policy 
with  energy  and  intelligence.  But  France,  as  we 
shall  see,  was  far  from  agreement  and  the  gov- 
ernment was  now  confounded  with  the  will  of  the 
sovereign. 

Napoleon  III.  was  not  a  small  man;  he  had 
genius;  he  had  ideas  larger  and  more  profound 
than  are  possessed  by  the  hacks  of  statesmanship. 
He  understood  men  and  knew  how  to  manage 
them.  He  was  animated  by  noble  ambitions,  and, 
while  he  remained  in  full  health  and  vigour,  he 
did  not  lack  courage  and  resolution.  While,  how- 
ever, he  possessed  neither  the  qualities  nor  the 
defects  of  a  great  tyrant,  his  ambition  to  reconquer 
for  his  family  the  crown  of  Napoleon  I.,  the  per- 
turbation of  the  times,  and  a  fear  lest  his  own 
sovereign  authority  might  not  be  regarded  as 
legitimate,  and  consequently  might  not  be  re- 
spected by  all,  had  led  him  to  give  the  Republic 
and  afterwards  to  retouch  and  transfer  to  the 
Empire  a  constitution  which  required  a  despot 
of  genius  as  the  Head  of  the  State  and  times 
and  circumstances  favourable  to  such  a  Ruler's 
activities. 


The  Germanic  Triumph  119 

This  constitution  was  theoretically  most  in- 
genious, but  it  was  wholly  inspired  by  distrust  of 
Parliamentarism  and  political  liberty.  It  was 
calculated  to  defend  the  authority  of  a  somewhat 
adventitious  and  improvised  monarchy  such  as  his 
against  the  darts  of  the  press,  the  thunders  of  the 
tribune,  and  the  spirit  of  criticism  and  revolt  of 
great  and  small.'  But  it  also  had  the  effect  of 
isolating  the  monarch  in  a  kind  of  fortress  over- 
looked from  all  sides  for  it  interposed  between  his 
authority  and  the  great  representative  and  ad- 
ministrative bodies  of  the  Empire,  which  he  should 
have  ruled  and  turned  to  his  advantage,  so  many 
privileges  of  a  personal  power  which  no  one  man 
could  exercise  that  these  bodies  in  great  measure 
escaped  from  his  control,  remained  independent, 
and  withheld  the  collaboration  which  was  indis- 
pensable. If  the  Head  of  the  State  had  been  a 
man  of  great  energy,  readiness,  and  authority,  and, 
like  the  First  Consul  who  ruled  a  State  which  was 
still  simple,  had  been  able  to  see  everything  with 
his  own  eyes  and  do  everything  with  his  own  hands, 
the  constitution  might  have  been  excellent.  But 
by  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century,  chiefly 
owing  to  the  development  of  industry  on  the  great 
scale,  public  affairs  had  greatly  increased  in  volume 
and  in  complication,  and,  as  we  have  seen,  the 


I20  Problems  of  Peace 

nephew,  though  a  man  of  no  mean  abiHty,  had 
neither  the  virtues  nor  the  vices  which  had  led  the 
credulous  masses  to  revere  the  uncle  as  a  demigod. 
Thus  he  was  in  the  position  of  having  seized 
vast  powers  which  he  could  only  exercise  to  a  very 
limited  extent,  and  which  instead  of  strength- 
ening weakened  his  government,  especially  as  the 
fear  of  revolution  which  had  raised  him  to  the 
throne  began  to  pass  away  with  the  lapse  of  years. 
The  Legitimists  and  the  Orleanists  began  once 
more  to  regard  him  as  a  usurper  and  the  Republi- 
cans execrated  him  as  a  traitor.  It  was  in  vain 
that  Universal  Suffrage,  terror-stricken  by  the 
sceptre  so  suddenly  offered,  had  tried  to  secure 
obedience  by  hiding  itself  behind  the  hat  and 
sword  of  Napoleon!  The  new  authority,  which 
according  to  the  letter  of  the  constitution  was  so 
strong,  seemed  too  Republican  to  the  convinced 
monarchists  who  believed  in  Divine  Right,  too 
monarchical  to  the  Republicans  who  beheved  in 
the  Sovereignty  of  the  People,  and  too  authorita- 
rian to  the  Liberals.  Its  legitimacy  was  therefore 
dubious  in  the  eyes  of  all  parties;  it  was  toler- 
ated, endured,  and  courted  by  all,  but  sincerely 
supported  by  none.  In  the  days  of  its  success  it 
had  many  flatterers,  and  many  who  were  ready 
to  exploit  its  fortunes,  but  it  found  few  faithful, 


The  Germanic  Triumph  121 

capable,  and  sincere  servants  in  its  time  of  trouble. 
It  raised  hopes  which  could  not  be  realized,  and, 
as  years  passed,  it  became  the  victim  of  a  growing 
weakness  all  the  more  dangerous  because  it  could 
not  be  avowed  for  the  very  reason  that  it  had  been 
accepted  and  obeyed  by  the  people  in  the  firm 
belief  that  it  was  very  strong.  This  was  the  reason 
why  it  could  neither  dominate  nor  profit  by  the 
tumultuous  uncertainties  of  the  situation  in  Eu- 
rope which  had  been  set  free  by  the  events  of 
1848. 

The  war  in  Italy  clearly  proved  this.  This  war 
was  willed  and  had  long  been  planned  and  maturely 
considered  by  Napoleon  III.  owing  to  certain 
views,  both  true  and  profound,  which  he  held  con- 
cerning the  state  of  Europe  and  the  tendency  of 
the  times.  Europe  in  his  opinion,  since  the  scheme 
set  up  by  the  Congress  of  Vienna  had  fallen  to 
pieces,  required  a  new  order.  To  create  this  new 
order  it  would  be  necessary  to  take  more  accoimt 
in  the  future  than  in  the  past  of  the  reawakened 
spirit  of  nationalism.  It  w^ould  be  necessary  to 
repeat  for  Italy  the  great  victory  of  the  treaties 
of  1 81 5,  to  satisfy  certain  of  the  legitimate  ambi- 
tions of  Germany,  and  to  make  some  provision  for 
the  future  of  Poland.  These  ideas  had  been  left 
in  the  minds  of  many  by  the  Revolution  of  1848. 


122  Problems  of  Peace 

They  were,  it  may  be  said,  in  the  air,  and  they 
exalted  the  dynastic  ambition  of  the  nephew  of 
Napoleon  L,  while  they  satisfied  the  longings  of 
his  somewhat  visionary  spirit. 

How  could  he  show  himself  more  worthy  of  the 
name  under  which  he  had  ascended  the  throne 
than  by  giving  Europe  the  benefits  of  a  more  solid, 
more  equitable,  more  liberal,  and  more  fraternal 
order  of  things  ?  But  in  order  to  rearrange  Europe, 
beginning  with  a  reconstitution  of  Italy,  it  was 
necessary  to  declare  war  on  Austria — an  enterprise 
which  the  friendship  of  Piedmont  had  now  made 
possible  and  which  had  great  attractions  for  the 
nephew  of  the  great  Napoleon.  It  would  be  a  kind 
of  dynastic  vengeance  for  1815,  it  would  increase 
the  authority  of  France  in  Italy,  and  at  the  same 
time,  while  liberating  Italy  from  the  hands  of  her 
executioner,  would  improve  the  general  equi- 
librium of  Europe.  Precisely,  however,  because 
these  views  of  Italian  affairs  were  both  broad  and 
elevated,  they  were  not  accessible  to  all  men,  even 
in  France,  where,  though  there  were  parties  capa- 
ble of  understanding  them,  there  were  other 
parties  who  wished  for  peace,  feared  war,  and  con- 
sidered European  questions  from  the  narrow  point 
of  view  of  national  profit.  Moreover,  if  France 
was  to  make  war  on  Austria  as  the  ally  of  Piedmont, 


The  Germanic  Triumph  123 

a  pretext  must  be  found  which  was  not  too  much 
at  variance  with  diplomatic  tradition  and  the 
principles  of  international  law  as  commonly  under- 
stood. Napoleon  III.  could  not  say  that  he  wanted 
to  declare  war  on  Austria  in  order  to  avenge 
Waterloo,  to  correct  the  injustice  done  to  Italy 
by  the  Congress  of  Vienna,  or  to  lay  the  foundation 
of  a  new  Europe  which  would  be  more  just  and 
more  enduring. 

It  is  not  surprising,  therefore,  that  although  he 
had  long  made  up  his  mind  to  go  to  war  and  had 
come  to  an  arrangement  with  Piedmont  for  waging 
it  in  alliance  with  her,  Napoleon  at  the  last  moment, 
in  the  early  days  of  1859,  was  seized  with  one 
of  those  fits  of  perplexed  hesitation  which  were 
destined  so  often  to  give  cold  shivers  to  Cavour. 
England  was  doing  her  very  utmost  at  Paris, 
Vienna,  Berlin,  and  St.  Petersburg  to  prevent  war, 
as  were  the  peace  parties  in  France.  It  was  a 
case  in  which  there  were  plenty  of  good  reasons 
for  making  war  but  not  the  slightest  pretext  for 
declaring  it. 

Whoever  re-reads  today  the  history  of  the 
diplomatic  manoeuvres  of  those  months  will  ask 
himself  how  Napoleon  III.  could  possibly  have 
effected  his  purpose  of  declaring  war  if  he  had  not 
been  favoured  by  the  rancour  of  Russia  and  the 


124  Problems  of  Peace 

anger  of  Austria.  It  was  Russia  who,  out  of  irrita- 
tion at  what  she  considered  the  treason  of  Austria 
during  the  Crimean  War,  prevented  the  Powers 
from  forming  among  themselves  a  coaHtion  for  the 
maintenance  of  peace  by  refusing  to  take  part  in 
any  of  England's  efforts  to  secure  that  object.  It 
was  Austria  that,  by  requiring  Piedmont  to  dismiss 
her  volunteers  and  to  disarm,  supplied  Napoleon 
with  the  slight  pretext  which  brought  about  the 
war  for  which  there  were  such  grave  reasons. 
But  were  not  these  hesitations  and  perplexities, 
making  doubtful  at  the  last  moment  an  enterprise 
which  had  been  so  long  planned;  was  not  this 
profound  contrast  between  the  motive  and  the 
pretext,  the  spirit  and  the  form  of  the  war,  a  proof 
that  Napoleon  was  attempting  something  which 
was  beyond  his  strength? 

The  discrepancy  became  more  manifest  as  the 
campaign  proceeded.  Napoleon  had  crossed  the 
Alps  in  order  to  drive  Austria  out  of  Italy  and  to 
unify  Northern  Italy  under  the  sceptre  of  the 
House  of  Savoy,  including  part  of  the  Legations 
in  the  new  Kingdom.  In  Central  Italy  he  intended 
to  establish  a  monarchy  which  would  include  most 
of  the  States  of  the  Church.  The  Kingdom  of 
the  two  Sicilies  was  to  be  left  in  being  and  these 
three  States  were  to  be  united  in  a  Confederation 


The  Germanic  Triumph  125 

under  the  presidency  of  the  Pope,  who  was  to 
retain  Rome  and  a  little  neighbouring  territory. 
Napoleon  was  opposed  to  complete  unification, 
partly  because  he  was  afraid  that  a  united  Italy 
might  be  dangerous  to  France  and  partly  because 
he  feared  that  unification  in  Italy  might  be  too 
powerfiil  a  stimulant  for  Germany.  Moreover, 
not  only  Napoleon  but  all  the  Powers  were  so 
much  against  the  imity  of  Italy  that  Cavour  him- 
self in  the  years  before  the  war  had  set  it  aside  as 
an  unattainable  dream.  As,  however,  the  allied 
armies,  proceeding  from  one  victory  to  another, 
drove  back  the  Austrians  towards  the  Quadri- 
lateral, all  Italy  was  stirred.  The  mere  announce- 
ment that  France  and  Piedmont  had  accepted 
Austria's  challenge  was  enough  to  bring  about  a 
bloodless  revolution  at  Florence,  where  the  Grand 
Duke  was  forced  to  depart  and  the  dictatorship 
offered  to  Victor  Emanuel.  After  the  Battle  of 
Magenta  the  Duke  of  Parma  and  Modena  fled, 
and  on  June  nth,  when  Austria  withdrew  her 
troops  from  Bologna  and  Ferrara,  Romagna  and 
the  Marches  also  revolted  and  begged  the  King  of 
Sardim'a  to  assume  the  dictatorship. 

The  plan  of  reconstituting  Italy  as  a  Federation 
of  national  States  would  have  been  a  very  fine  one 
had  it  not  been  for  the  fact  that  there  was  no  raw 


126  Problems  of  Peace 

material  on  which  to  work,  that  is  to  say,  no  States 
to  federate,  each  of  which  was  capable,  at  least  to 
a  certain  extent,  of  subsisting  by  its  own  strength. 
The  States  of  Italy  had  no  indisputable  historic 
title  to  existence;  they  were  wanting  in  that 
prestige  which  a  strong  State  knows  how  to  earn 
by  its  achievements.  They  were  detested  by  a 
rich  and  educated  minority,  and  barely  tolerated 
by  the  majority  which  obeyed  only  because  they 
were  compelled.  They  were,  in  fact,  merely  the 
disjecta  membra  of  a  nation  which  Austria  had 
dressed  out  as  Duchies,  Archduchies,  and  King- 
doms and  which  the  people  overthrew  and  de- 
stroyed as  soon  as  the  bureaucracy  had  been  forced 
to  fly.  None  of  them  governed  by  its  own  strength, 
for  all  depended  on  the  support  of  Austria,  and 
either  collapsed  at  once  like  Tuscany,  Modena,  and 
Parma,  or  tottered  like  the  Papal  States  and  the 
Kingdom  of  the  two  SiciUes  as  soon  as  Austria 
began  to  retreat  in  the  Valley  of  the  Po,  abandon- 
ing her  former  proteges  and  allies.  From  one  end 
of  the  peninsula  to  the  other,  in  fact,  the  victories 
of  the  French  and  Piedmontese  arms  caused  an 
explosion  of  the  civil  war  which  slumbered  in  the 
bosom  of  every  State  like  lightning  in  a  thunder- 
cloud. The  absolutist  and  Austrian  party  which 
had  been  the  oppressor  for  so  many  years  felt  its 


The  Germanic  Triumph  127 

knees  giving  way  with  a  sudden  weakness,  and 
tottered  or  actually  fell  at  the  first  threat.  The 
oppressed  who  formed  the  liberal,  constitutional, 
and  nationalist  party  rose  and  threatened  their 
adversaries  even  when  they  did  not  succeed  in 
overthrowing  them. 

Napoleon  III.  was  not  long  in  perceiving  that 
every  stroke  of  his  army  directed  against  Aus- 
tria was  shaking  the  old  Italy  of  1815  to  its  founda- 
tions, and  he  took  alarm,  for  an  Italian  revolution 
was  the  very  thing  he  did  not  want .  Other  anxieties 
also  assailed  him  in  the  midst  of  his  victories — 
the  heavy  casualties  and  the  consequent  effect 
on  French  public  opinion,  the  discontent  of  the 
Catholic  party  at  the  revolution  in  the  Papal 
States,  and,  not  least,  the  news  from  Germany, 
for  the  Germanic  Confederation  and  Prussia  were 
beginning  to  take  umbrage  at  the  French  victories 
in  the  Valley  of  the  Po.  Frightened  by  his  own 
work  and  feeling  that  his  hand  was  being  forced, 
Napoleon  broke  off  abruptly  the  enterprise  he 
could  no  longer  control.  On  July  i  ith  he  met  the 
Emperor  of  Austria  at  Villafranca  and  arrived  at  a 
peaceful  understanding  with  him.  Austria  was  to 
cede  Lombardy  to  France  who  would  transfer 
the  province  to  the  Kingdom  of  Sardinia.  An 
Italian  Federation  v/ould  be  constituted  under  the 


128  Problems  of  Peace 

presidency  of  the  Pope.  A  plan  of  reforms  would 
be  worked  out  for  the  States  of  the  Church,  and 
the  Grand  Duke  of  Tuscany  and  the  Duke  of 
Modena  would  be  restored  to  their  dominions. 

This  peace — a  compromise  between  wHl  and 
power,  the  will  of  a  fine  but  somewhat  visionary 
mind  and  the  power  of  a  parvenu  and  spurious 
emperor — plimged  Italian  affairs  which  it  was 
intended  to  settle  into  a  confusion  which  was  even 
greater  than  that  which  had  existed  before  the 
war.  Some  of  the  Italian  States  had  overthrown 
their  governments  in  order  to  join  the  Kingdom  of 
Sardinia;  others,  the  States  of  the  Church  and  the 
Kingdom  of  Naples,  more  especially  Sicily,  were 
conspiring  and  revolting  in  order  to  do  likewise. 
Such  governments  as  had  not  already  fallen  were 
trembling  in  the  consciousness  that  their  days 
were  numbered  now  that  Austria  was  no  longer 
there  to  support  them,  and  they  no  longer  knew 
to  which  Saint  they  should  appeal  for  succour. 
Meanwhile  the  plenipotentiaries  of  the  three 
belligerents  met  at  Zurich  in  August  in  order  to 
draw  up  and  ratify  the  definitive  Treaty  which 
was  to  federate  States  which  had  either  ceased  to 
exist  or  were  in  imminent  danger  of  disappearing, 
to  restore  to  the  Duke  of  Modena  and  the  Grand 
Duke  of  Tuscany  territories  which  one  of  the  three 


The  Germanic  Triumph  129 

parties  to  the  Treaty,  the  King  of  Sardinia,  already- 
regarded  as  his  own,  and  to  propound  reforms  for 
the  Papal  States  which  for  the  most  part  were  in 
open  rebellion ! 

There  were  only  two  ways  in  which  the  Italian 
Question  could  be  settled.  Either  a  preponder- 
ating foreign  power — France  or  Austria — would 
have  to  intervene  again  to  settle  things  according 
to  its  own  views,  as  in  181 5,  or  the  two  parties 
into  w^hich  Italy  was  divided  would  have  to  be  left 
to  fight  out  the  issue  between  themselves,  so  that 
the  victor  might  establish  a  system  that  had  some 
life  in  it.  Austria,  however,  being  now  resigned 
to  the  loss  of  Lombardy,  stood  apart.  She  was 
delighted  that  France  was  perhaps  more  dis- 
concerted by  her  victory  than  she  would  have 
been  by  a  defeat  and  she  contented  herself  with 
insisting  that  the  agreements  m.ade  by  the  impos- 
sible Peace  of  Villafranca  should  be  carried  out. 
Napoleon  extricated  himself  as  best  he  could. 
None  of  the  Powers  was  willing  to  admit  that  the 
ancient  order  was  at  an  end  in  Italy  and  that  a 
breath  of  Revolution  could  now  upset  it  finally  at 
any  time,  and  all  persisted  in  trying  to  revivify 
what  was  dead  and  to  kill  what  was  alive. 

The  Italy  imagined  by  Napoleon  III.  and 
approved  by  Europe  was  a  heap  of  inanimate 


130  Problems  of  Peace 

fragments,  and  it  fell  to  pieces  under  the  efforts 
made  by  its  authors  to  set  it  going.  Out  of  these 
dead  and  inarticulate  fragments  the  Kingdom  of 
Sardinia  was  to  create  a  living  organism  capable 
of  ruling  itself  and  walking  alone.  How  could 
this  be  done  if  not  by  collecting  into  a  single  State 
the  States  which  after  1859  either  had  no  govern- 
ment at  all  or  a  government  on  the  point  of 
collapsing?  The  unification  of  Italy  was  no  pro- 
duct of  precocious  ambition  but  a  necessity  im- 
posed by  the  gap  left  when  Austria  retired  from 
the  country  after  fifty-four  years  of  predominance. 
Europe,  however,  would  not  hear  reason,  for 
Italian  unity  was  terrible  in  its  eyes.  To  secure 
it  required  all  the  audacity  and  the  resourceful- 
ness of  a  great  statesman,  fertile  in  the  expedients, 
the  intrigues,  and  the  manoeuvres  of  diplomacy. 
It  was  necessary  to  make  more  revolutions  and 
more  wars,  to  cede  Nice  and  Savoy  to  France,  and, 
in  some  cases  of  extreme  necessity,  even  to  break 
international  law,  for  which  the  Great  Powers 
were  so  solicitous  when  it  secured  them  the  tran- 
quil enjoyment  of  their  possessions,  in  order  to 
deliver  Italy  from  the  almost  desperate  position 
to  which  she  had  been  reduced  by  the  hesitating 
intervention  of  Napoleon  III.  and  the  timid 
selfishness  of  Europe. 


The  Germanic  Triumph  131 

The  Power  which  first  saw  the  necessity  of 
recognizing  ItaHan  unity  was  England  after  Gari- 
baldi's expedition  to  Sicily  and  Southern  Italy. 
That  expedition  had  been  indeed  a  fiery  ordeal 
for  the  old  Italian  governments  which  Europe 
washed  to  federate  with  the  new.  Among  the 
expedients  for  extorting  from  Europe  its  consent 
to  the  inevitable,  which  was  still  obstinately  re- 
fused, the  Piedmontese  Government  had  formed 
the  plan  of  allowing  General  Garibaldi  to  attempt 
an  expedition  the  ostensible  object  of  which  was 
to  liberate  Sicily,  half  of  which  was  now  in  revolt. 
When,  however.  Garibaldi,  with  a  thousand  m.en, 
made  himself  master  of  Sicily,  Crispi  succeeded  in 
persuading  him  to  cross  to  the  mainland,  and,  in  a 
few  months,  after  he  had  been  joined  by  a  few 
more  thousands,  the  Bourbon  regime  fell  because 
it  had  been  abandoned  both  by  the  upper  and  by 
the  educated  classes  and  had  lost  all  confidence  in 
itself. 

In  a  word  the  logic  of  events  was  more  powerful 
than  the  schemes  of  men.  On  February  18,  1861, 
the  first  Italian  Parliament  met  at  Turin,  and  on 
March  i6th,  Victor  Emanuel  gave  his  assent  to 
the  law  which  proclaimed  him  King  of  Italy. 
Conservative  writers  all  over  Europe  bitterly 
reproached  the  Sardinian  Government  with  the 


132  Problems  of  Peace 

revolutionary  methods  they  had  used  on  more 
than  one  occasion.  For  the  first  time,  in  fact,  it 
had  between  1859  and  1861  become  clear  to  Eu- 
rope that  there  was  a  resolute  will  in  Italy  which 
knew  when  to  coax  and  when  to  threaten,  when  to 
hide  and  when  to  appear,  when  to  rush  forward 
and  when  to  stop,  and  which,  when  the  supreme 
necessity  arose,  could  dominate  the  weakness,  the 
irresolution,  the  dissensions,  and  the  veiled  selfish- 
ness of  the  Great  Powers,  now  no  longer  banded 
together  by  a  single  idea  and  a  unanimous  agree- 
ment. But  was  it  for  us  to  respect  this  weakness, 
for  us,  being  human,  and  not  wishing  to  take  what 
belonged  to  any  one  else  but  to  recover  what  was 
our  own,  to  conquer  the  rights  which  Austria  and 
the  old  governments  had  denied  to  us,  to  live  and 
work  in  a  free  and  peaceful  emulation  of  the  other 
European  nations  and  to  prevent  Central  Italy 
from  relapsing  into  the  savagery  of  a  Christian 
Morocco,  and  Southern  Italy  from  appearing  to 
the  traveller  not  as  one  extremity  of  Europe  but 
as  the  beginning  of  Asia?  The  reason  why  we 
had  to  use  these  dangerous  expedients  was  simply 
the  spite  of  Austria,  which,  after  fifty  years  of 
domination  in  the  peninsula,  had  left  behind  her 
an  immense  heap  of  putrifying  ruins  on  which  we 
had  to  build  a  wholly  new  edifice.     Who  were 


The  Germanic  Triumph  133 

the  sufferers  by  the  haste  in  which  unity  was 
achieved  but  ourselves,  whose  task  it  was  for 
another  fifty  years  to  be  constantly  repairing  and 
strengthening  this  new  structure  founded  on  the 
wreckage  of  the  old  governments?  The  new 
Italy  may  have  made  some  mistakes;  we  do  not 
believe  that  either  Europe  or  America  has  to  regret 
the  fact  that  for  half  a  century  she  has  been  one 
of  the  great  European  Powers. 

Unhappily  however — and  herein  lies  the  great 
tragedy  of  the  recent  history  of  Europe — there 
were  others  who  were  only  too  ready  to  follow 
her  example  with  quite  different  aims.  The 
Italian  crisis  as  usual  was  followed  by  a  Balkan 
crisis  and  a  Polish  crisis.  The  Balkan  crisis  was 
neither  violent  nor  bloody.  The  Assemblies  of 
Wallachia  and  Moldavia  had  both  elected  Alex- 
ander Couza  as  their  Prince,  and  the  two  Principal- 
ities thus  joined  in  a  personal  union  had  assumed 
the  collective  name  of  Roumania.  The  Polish 
crisis  on  the  other  hand  was  tremendous.  At 
the  beginning  of  1863  Russian  Poland,  wearied  of 
prolonged  Muscovite  oppression,  deceived  in  the 
hopes  it  had  formed  of  the  new  regime,  and  pro- 
voked by  some  of  the  usual  insane  violences  of 
the  St.  Petersburg  government,  rose  in  rebellion. 
Small  in  its  beginnings  the  insurrection  spread, 


134  Problems  of  Peace 

took  courage,  and  flared  up  into  a  civil  war  in 
which  no  quarter  was  given  or  taken  and  which 
stirred  Europe  to  its  foundations.  The  com- 
motion was  so  serious  that  the  greater  and  the 
lesser  Powers  took  a  step  almost  without  example 
and  on  April  17th  presented  remonstrances  to  the 
Russian  Government.  They  were  rebuffed  but 
they  returned  to  the  charge  in  June,  and  went  so 
far  as  to  set  out  the  reforms  which  they  con- 
sidered should  be  carried  out  in  Poland.  They 
were  not  discouraged  by  the  further  rebuff  which 
they  then  received,  and  in  August  presented  new 
remonstrances  which  met  with  no  greater  success. 
In  November,  Napoleon  III.  went  so  far  as  to 
propose  the  convocation  of  a  congress  of  the 
Powers  to  discuss  not  only  the  fate  of  Poland,  but 
the  whole  question  of  the  Treaties  of  18 15.  But 
England,  suspicious  of  any  attack  on  the  settle- 
ment of  1815,  opposed  the  proposal  and  failed. 
However,  together  with  the  other  protest  and 
remonstrances  which  had  been  made,  it  showed 
how  widespread  among  the  greater  European  na- 
tions was  the  feeling  that  justice  should  be  done 
to  the  nations  which  were  oppressed  and  deprived 
of  liberty — a  feeling  which  explains  some  of  the 
views  and  actions  of  Nai)olcon  III.,  many  of  his 
aspirations,  and  several  of  his  failures. 


The  Germanic  Triumph  135 

From  all  the  attempts  made  to  induce  Russia 
to  treat  Poland  fairly  Prussia  alone  among  the 
Powers  had  held  aloof.  There  some  remarkable 
innovations  had  been  recently  introduced.  On 
January  2,  1861,  Frederick  William  IV.  had  died 
without  issue  and  had  been  succeeded  by  his 
brother  William  I.  who  had  already  been  Regent 
for  some  time.  He  was  an  old  man  of  sixty -four 
who  as  a  boy  of  sixteen  had  taken  part  in  the 
campaign  of  18 13  against  Napoleon.  He  belonged 
therefore  to  the  generation  which  believed  in 
Divine  Right  and  the  doctrine  of  Legitimacy;  he 
was  a  survivor  of  the  age  which  passed  away  for 
ever  in  1848,  and  of  him  one  of  his  most  famous 
ministers  afterwards  said  with  regret:  "He  had 
too  many  legitimist  prejudices."  When  he  as- 
cended the  throne,  he  at  once  declared  that  he 
regarded  himself  as  King  by  Divine  Right  and 
almost  at  once  came  in  conflict  with  his  Parliament 
about  certain  military  reforms  which  were  com- 
menced on  his  initiative  in  the  last  years  of  his 
brother's  reign.  The  Prussian  Army  had  done 
badly  in  1848  and  1849,  in  the  war  of  Holstein 
and  in  the  revolt  in  the  Grand  Duchy  of  Baden, 
and  had  made  an  even  worse  appearance  in  the 
mobilizations  of  1850  and  1859.  Many  soldiers 
had  in  vain  been  recalled  to  the  colours  and  those 


136  Problems  of  Peace 

who  responded  to  the  call  had  shown  great  indis- 
cipline and  had  even  committed  acts  of  disobedi- 
ence in  the  face  of  the  enemy.  The  army  had 
shown  itself  ill-trained,  and  wanting  in  fighting 
spirit.  It  was  at  that  time  rightly  considered, 
both  in  Prussia  and  elsewhere,  to  be  unsatisfactory 
and  out  of  date  because  it  had  kept  to  the  military 
constitution  of  1814  and  had  persisted  in  the 
almost  impossible  endeavour  to  squeeze  a  first -line 
army  of  more  than  350,000  men  at  a  very  moder- 
ate expense  out  of  a  poor  population  of  ten  millions, 
Prussia  had  been  the  first  European  nation  which 
had  dared  to  impose  military  service  as  a  duty  on 
all  its  citizens  without  exception,  at  the  same  time 
reducing  the  period  of  service  to  three  years. 
By  reducing  the  time  and  enlarging  the  incidence 
of  the  obUgation  she  was  able  to  keep  under  arms 
three  yearly  contingents  of  40,000  men  each  or 
120,000  in  all.  In  addition,  the  active  army  had 
as  a  reserve  two  yearly  contingents  which  had 
served  their  time,  or  60,000  men,  and  about 
170,000  from  the  first  ban  of  the  Landwehr,  con- 
sisting of  men  between  twenty-five  and  thirty-two. 
The  permanent  army  was  the  military  school  of 
the  Landwehr  of  which  about  half  of  the  front-line 
troops  was  composed.  As  most  of  them  had 
become  soft  by  many  years'  disuse  of  arms,  they 


The  Germanic  Triumph  137 

were  collected  in  regiments  each  of  which  was 
linked  with  a  regular  regiment  in  a  brigade,  the 
brigade  always  consisting  of  one  regiment  of  the 
line  and  one  Landwehr  regiment.  These  arrange- 
ments had  been  in  force  in  Prussia  since  18 14  and 
had  not  been  altered  up  to  1859.  Even  the 
annual  contingent  had  remained  at  40,000  men, 
though  the  population  had  practically  doubled  and 
could  easily  have  furnished  from  60,000  to  70,000 
fit  men  for  the  army.  It  had  been  the  desire  of 
the  league  of  the  dynasties  to  which  Frederick 
William  IV.  had  been  so  faithful  all  his  life  that 
neither  armies  nor  expenses  should  be  increased. 
But  in  1859  the  league  of  the  dynasties  was 
broken,  and  since  1848  the  Temple  of  Janus,  which 
had  been  reopened  during  the  Revolution,  had 
not  been  closed  again  except  for  very  brief  inter- 
vals. Though  imbued  with  '  *  legitimist  prejudices ' ' 
the  aged  William  was  convinced  that  the  times 
required  a  military  reform  and  he  resolved  to 
increase  his  army  expenditure,  not  in  order  to 
increase  the  ntmibers  of  his  soldiers  but  to  improve 
their  quality.  The  military  reforms  which  were 
proposed  in  Prussia  about  i860  were  the  last 
homage  paid  by  the  German  nation  to  the  miHtary 
principles  which  the  ancient  world  and  Europe 
had  always  professed — that  the  strength  of  an 


138  Problems  of  Peace 

army  does  not  reside  in  the  numbers  but  in  the 
quaHty  of  its  soldiers.  The  annual  contingent 
was  now  to  be  63,000  men,  so  that  the  standing 
army  would  be  increased  from  130,000,  including 
officers  and  labourers,  to  260,000.  The  reserve 
was  to  be  composed  of  the  time-expired  contingents 
not  of  the  last  two,  but  of  the  last  four,  years — 
about  160,000  men — and  the  standing  army  and 
the  reserve,  not  including  the  Landwehr,  would 
give  a  new  first-line  army  of  about  370,000  men,  no 
more  numerous  but  much  more  vigorous  than  the 
old;  because  more  than  half  of  the  troops  were 
men  of  the  standing  army,  and  the  rest  time- 
expired,  but  quite  young,  men  of  twenty-three  to 
twenty-seven  years  old. 

The  numbers  were  equal,  the  quality  was  bet- 
ter, and,  as  a  necessary  consequence  of  improved 
quality,  the  expense  was  to  be  greater.  But  could 
it  be  expected  that  a  Parliament  would  be  willing 
to  pay  millions  in  hard  cash  for  such  an  invisible 
and  purely  conjectural  benefit  as  an  improvement 
in  quality?  This  was  the  cause  of  the  quarrel. 
The  King,  who  did  not  wish  to  give  way  to  Parlia- 
ment and  did  not  know  how  to  quell  the  opposition, 
decided  at  last  (on  September  24,  1862)  to  appoint 
as  President  of  his  Council  of  Ministers  Otto  von 
Bismarck-Schoenhauscn,  whose  triumphant  career 


The  Germanic  Triumph  139 

was  destined  to  be  the  object  of  the  most  abject 
idolatry  of  Europe  and  of  the  world  until  the  out- 
break of  the  European  war  in  1914. 

Whether  his  genius  really  deserved  the  universal 
admiration  which  it  received  until  19 14  need  not 
be  discussed  because,  in  order  to  discuss  it,  it 
would  be  necessary  to  define  what  kind  of  genius 
is  worthy  of  universal  respect.  As  this  is  a  point 
on  which  the  ideas  of  mankind  are  neither  clear 
nor  agreed,  one  observation  on  him  and  his  unfor- 
tunate adversary  Napoleon  III.  must  suffice  here. 
Whatever  may  have  been  his  genius,  there  can  be 
no  doubt — the  following  pages  will  prove  it — that 
Bismarck  succeeded  in  conquering  and  dominating 
Germany  and  Europe  during  so  many  years  be- 
cause he  ruthlessly  and  recklessly  exploited  for 
the  benefit  of  his  country,  his  party,  his  class,  and 
his  own  ambition  the  discord  and  the  incoherent 
and  inconclusive  agitation  into  which  the  Con- 
tinent had  fallen  after  1848  and  the  end  of  the 
Holy  Alliance.  Nature  had  given  him  all  the 
qualities,  and  fortune  all  the  means,  which  could 
enable  him  to  rise  on  the  ruin  of  others.  Napoleon 
III.,  on  the  other  hand,  succumbed  because  he 
wished,  not  to  exploit,  but  to  cure  the  ills  of  Europe 
by  making  its  equilibrium  more  stable,  and  be- 
cause he  had  neither  the  natural   qualities   nor 


140  Problems  of  Peace 

the  material  means  which  were  necessary  in  order 
to  carry  out  so  great  a  plan.  This  being  said  it  is 
for  each  man  to  judge  the  two  antagonists  as  he 
pleases;  here  it  is  not  our  business  to  judge  but  to 
narrate. 

Having  been  made  Minister,  Bismarck  pressed 
forward  the  military  reforms  and  informed  Parlia- 
ment that  they  would  be  carried  out  whether 
Parliament  approved  them  or  not.  Then,  when  the 
Polish  revolution  broke  out,  he  proposed  to  Russia 
a  convention  whereby  the  Prussian  and  Russian 
armies  should  concert  measures  on  the  frontier 
for  the  repression  of  the  revolt  and,  if  necessary, 
even  cross  the  frontier  in  pursuit  of  the  rebels. 
While  all  Europe — including  Austria,  which  did 
not  wish  to  quarrel  with  the  Galicians — was  in- 
viting Russia  to  recognize  the  rights  of  Poland, 
Prussia  declared  her  solidarity  with  Russia  in  the 
work  of  repression.  By  this  first  bargain  at  the 
expense  of  European  discord  Prussia  gratuitously 
acquired  the  friendship  of  Russia,  offended  by  the 
intervention  of  the  other  Powers.  A  coolness 
arose  between  the  Russian  Court  and  Government 
and  all  other  countries,  including  France  with 
whom  they  were  on  the  very  point  of  concluding 
an  alliance,  and  Russia  and  Prussia  struck  up  a 
friendship  which  was  to  last  throughout  the  life 


The  Germanic  Triumph  141 

of  Alexander  11.  and  to  protect  Prussia's  rear  in  the 
three  wars  on  which  she  was  about  to  embark  in 
order  to  realize  her  ambitions.  The  first  of  these 
wars  had  neither  reason  nor  pretext,  beyond 
Prussia's  covetous  desire  to  deprive  a  weaker 
State  of  a  splendid  harbour  and  to  acquire  territory 
in  which  a  canal  could  be  dug  connecting  the  Bal- 
tic with  the  North  Sea.  As  recounted  above, 
war  had  broken  out  between  Denmark  and  Ger- 
many as  early  as  1848  on  the  subject  of  the  Duchy 
of  Holstein,  which  was  populated  by  Germans 
and  which,  like  the  little  Duchy  of  Lauenberg, 
belonged  to  the  Danish  crowm  while  forming  part 
of  the  Germanic  Confederation.  The  Confedera- 
tion had  ultimately  been  obliged,  owing  to  the 
protests  of  the  Powers,  to  restore  the  Duchy  to 
Denmark,  but  Germany  had  been  offended  and 
had  made  a  grievance  of  this  as  if  she  had  been 
deprived  of  something  that  was  her  own.  She 
had  her  eye  not  only  on  Holstein  but  also  on  the 
Duchy  of  Schleswig,  situated  to  the  north  of  Hol- 
stein and  indubitably  Danish  by  language,  by 
race,  history,  and  traditions,  finding  in  every  act 
of  the  Danish  Government  a  pretext  for  protests, 
accusations,  and  recriminations.  Germany  was 
then  impotent,  but  Denmark  was  so  small  that  she 
provided  a  safe  object  on  which  to  vent  the  turbid 


142  Problems  of  Peace 

humoiirs  and  the  maniacal  unrest  which  had 
tormented  the  German  race  since  1815.  It  so 
happened  that  certain  measures  taken  by  the 
Danish  Government  in  1863  for  definitely  settling 
the  affairs  of  the  three  duchies  irritated  Germany 
to  such  a  point  that  the  Diet  of  Frankfort  threat- 
ened Federal  intervention.  The  death  of  King 
Frederick  VII.  which  took  place  on  November 
15th  and  the  accession  to  the  throne  of  Duke 
Christian  of  Gliicksburg,  who  had  been  adopted 
by  the  late  King  in  default  of  male  issue,  and  had 
been  recognized  by  the  Powers  as  Heir  by  the 
Treaty  of  London  of  May  8,  1852,  added  fuel  to 
the  flames.  The  situation  soon  developed  so  far 
that  Bismarck,  who  had  for  some  time  been  waiting 
for  his  opportunity,  made  up  his  mind  to  seize  the 
chance  of  sacrificing  the  first  victim  to  be  devoured 
by  the  hungry  jaws  of  Germany.  He  therefore 
anticipated  the  Diet  of  Frankfort,  which  on  Decem- 
ber 7th,  in  order  to  satisfy  public  opinion,  had  de- 
cided to  launch  a  Federal  execution  against  King 
Christian,  came  to  an  understanding  with  Austria 
which  was  at  first  reluctant,  and  in  accord  with  the 
Hapsburg  Emperor  issued  his  first  great  defiance 
to  Europe  by  requiring  Denmark  to  abrogate  the 
law  of  November  13th  which  had  arranged  the 
affairs  of  the  Duchy  of  Schleswig. 


The  Germanic  Triumph  143 

This  was  open  and  audacious  tyranny,  for  the 
law  in  question  was  an  internal  law  made  for  the 
territories  and  the  purposes  of  the  State  of  Den- 
mark in  the  legitimate  exercise  of  its  own  sover- 
eignty. It  was  an  act  of  oppression  which  could 
not  be  justified  in  any  way  by  any  interest  of 
Prussia,  for  what  Denmark  had  done  and  was  doing 
vidthin  her  own  boundaries  neither  threatened  nor 
offended  Prussia  in  the  remotest  degree.  Such 
tyranny  should  have  been  repressed  by  Europe. 
But  Eiirope  did  nothing,  though  the  insolence  of 
the  provocation  was  resented  here  and  there. 
Russia  was  too  grateful  to  Prussia  for  having 
repudiated  European  intervention  in  Poland. 
England,  always  tormented  by  her  distrust  of 
France,  regarded  Prussia  as  an  old  ally  who  might 
yet  be  of  service  to  her.  Even  Napoleon  III. 
was  rather  well  disposed  towards  Prussia,  more 
especially  since  the  coolness  had  arisen  between 
him  and  Russia  and  since  the  failure  of  his  pro- 
posed conference  on  Polish  affairs,  which  had  irri- 
tated him  and  indeed  frightened  him  a  little. 
Moreover  the  Duchies  were  so  small  and  so  far  off ! 
In  the  result  no  one  moved,  and  the  two  wolves 
were  left  free  to  devour  the  lamb.  When,  how- 
ever, the  Austrian  and  Prussian  armies,  after  in- 
vading Holstein,  passed  into  Schleswig  and  thence 


144  Problems  of  Peace 

into  Jutland  itself,  Europe  was  again  moved. 
This  was  too  flagrant  an  abuse  of  power !  England 
intervened,  and  what  she  said  and  did  was  enough 
to  secure  the  convocation  of  a  Congress  of  the 
Powers  which  met  in  London  in  the  month  of 
April  to  discuss  terms  of  peace.  But  the  Congress 
met  only  to  hear  Austria  and  Prussia  declare  that 
in  addition  to  Holstein  they  proposed  to  deprive 
Denmark  of  Schleswig.  Protests  and  discussions 
were  vain;  no  Power  was  prepared  to  come  to  an 
understanding  with  the  others  to  threaten  in 
earnest,  and,  if  necessary,  to  take  arms.  The 
Congress  was  dissolved  without  coming  to  any 
conclusion  and  a  little  later  King  Christian, 
despairing  of  help  from  Europe,  asked  his  enemies 
for  peace  and  was  deprived  of  Lauenburg,  Hol- 
stein, and  the  Danish  territory  of  Schleswig. 

Bismarck  had  made  his  first  test  of  the  con- 
science and  clear-sightedness  of  Europe.  It  was 
a  small  and  a  short  test  but  it  encouraged  him  to 
repeat  the  experiment  with  greater  boldness  and 
with  a  greater  prize  in  view.  He  now  began  to 
prepare  for  war  with  Austria  herself  and  for  a  new 
Germanic  Confederation,  with  Prussia  as  its  sole 
Head.  It  is  very  often  said  that  Bismarck  was 
the  great  architect  of  German  unity,  but  this  only 
serves  to  demonstrate  that  the  fate  of  a  phrase 


The  Germanic  Triumph  145 

is  often  as  strange  as  that  of  any  human  being. 
The  Germanic  Confederation  created  by  the  Con- 
gress of  Vienna  was  certainly  far  from  power- 
ful in  comparison  with  the  great  European 
States.  Though  it  included  the  Austrian  Empire 
and  the  Kingdom  of  Prussia  so  far  as  their  ter- 
ritories were  inhabited  by  Germans,  it  did  not 
possess  the  authority'-  which  was  necessary  to 
enable  it  to  be  the  supreme  organ  of  the  interests, 
the  needs,  and  the  aspirations  common  to  all 
German  States,  treating  all  as  equals  and  making 
none  the  tool  of  another.  Why  then  did  this 
imiter  of  Germany  contrive  a  great  war  whereby 
the  unity  that  existed  was  split  into  three  frag- 
ments, which  left  the  German  States  of  the  Aus- 
trian Empire  to  live  apart  under  the  Hapsburg 
sceptre,  and  constituted  a  Confederation  north  of 
the  Rhine  imder  the  hegemony  of  Prussia,  leaving 
in  at  least  apparent  autonomy  the  States  of  South- 
em  Germany  ? 

The  truth  is  very  different.  What  Germany  had 
longed  for  so  fanatically,  and  had  dreamed  of  for 
so  many  years  in  a  delirium  constantly  fomented 
by  her  philosophers,  her  historians,  her  musicians, 
and  her  poets,  was  not  the  unification  of  Germany 
in  the  proper  sense  of  the  term,  but  a  powerful 
German  Empire  which  would  show  that  Germany 


10 


146  Problems  of  Peace 

was  capable  of  doing  what  France  had  done  from 
the  days  of  Louis  XIV.  to  those  of  Napoleon  I., 
and  even  more.  The  Germanic  Confederation 
could  not  arm  itself  seriously  or  make  itself  feared, 
owing  partly  to  its  very  origin  and  composition, 
partly  to  the  rivalry  of  Prussia  and  Austria.  Ger- 
many would  never  be  able  to  reforge  her  sword, 
which  had  once  been  so  much  dreaded,  until  she 
was  federated  either  under  Prussia  or  under 
Austria.  Bismarck  naturally  preferred  Prussia. 
But  to  exclude  the  Austrian  Empire  from  the  new 
Teutonic  Confederation  was  so  serious  an  enter- 
prise that  Bismarck,  who  was  no  dreamer,  never 
thought  of  including  therein  the  German  States 
belonging  to  the  Hapsburg  Crown  or  of  eliminating 
Austria.  He  therefore  decided  to  split  the  Con- 
federation in  order  to  shape  from  its  largest 
fragment  the  powerful  war  weapon  of  which  Ger- 
many dreamed.  The  population  of  Prussia,  how- 
ever, was  18,000,000,  while  Austria,  even  after 
the  loss  of  LxDmbardy,  had  more  than  double  that 
number  of  subjects.  Moreover  it  was  probable 
that  in  the  war  Austria  would  be  assisted  by 
the  most  powerful  States  of  the  Confederation. 
Bismarck  could  not  think  of  making  war  without 
an  ally,  and  without  the  acquiescence  of  the  Great 
Powers  of  Europe.     He  was  safe  from  Russia,  but 


The  Germanic  Triumph  147 

what  of  France?  Would  France  permit  a  great 
German  Army  to  be  prepared  on  her  frontiers 
under  the  leadership  of  Prussia? 

Everything  depended  on  this.  From  the  outset 
of  his  administration  Bismarck,  in  order  to  ingrati- 
ate himself  with  France,  had  not  spared  good 
words,  effusive  cordiality,  coaxing  smiles,  or  vague 
promises.  Every  now  and  then,  by  what  he  said 
and  by  what  he  did  not  say,  he  had  tried  to  let 
it  be  understood  that  Prussia  would  even  be  not 
unwilling  to  make  concessions  to  France  on  the 
left  bank  of  the  Rhine!  But,  though  the  fox  at 
the  foot  of  the  tree  spoke  very  eloquently,  the 
crow  was  not  deluded.  All  his  manoeuvres  would 
have  been  of  little  use  if  France  had  not  in  a  sense 
been  compelled  to  lend  an  ear  (though  with  the 
intention  of  deceiving  the  tempter  in  the  end), 
owing  to  the  affairs  of  Italy  and  the  difficulties 
they  were  causing  because  they  had  been  only  half 
settled. 

The  key  to  the  events  of  1866,  which  are  so 
strange  when  regarded  by  themselves,  is,  in  fact, 
in  Italy.  As  we  have  seen,  the  Kingdom  of  Italy 
had  been  constituted  in  1861,  and  in  the  lifetime 
of  Cavour  had  proclaimed  that  its  capital  was 
Rome.  It  had  been  recognized,  although  with 
the  greatest  reluctance,  by  all  the  Powers  except 


148  Problems  of  Peace 

Austria.  It  was  however  a  mutilated  State  be- 
cause it  still  lacked  Rome  and  Venice.  The 
proclamation  of  Rome  as  its  capital  had  been 
the  supreme  pledge  and  the  supreme  defiance 
of  the  Revolution,  which  regarded  the  Pope  as 
its  most  dangerous  enemy  next  to  Austria.  For 
France  it  had  been  a  source  of  grave  anxiety. 
Napoleon  III.,  who  had  already  lost  the  goodwill 
of  the  Catholic  party  because  he  had  allowed  the 
States  of  the  Church  to  be  dismembered  in  i860 
and  1861,  could  not  allow  Italy  to  take  possession 
of  the  Eternal  City  without  running  the  risk  of 
most  serious  internal  difficulties.  However,  in 
the  years  that  followed,  the  Roman  Question 
seemed  to  have  been  practically  settled,  for  Italy 
had  given  her  pledge  to  France  to  respect  the  Pon- 
tifical territories  and  to  transfer  the  capital  to 
another  city.  In  return  France  undertook  to 
withdraw  her  garrison  from  Rome  within  two 
years.  The  Venetian  Question  on  the  other  hand 
was  an  open  wound  which  threatened  to  suppurate 
and  to  require  operative  surgery  at  any  moment. 
It  was  not  to  be  supposed  that  Venice  could 
resign  herself  to  the  Austrian  yoke  when  she  saw 
by  her  side  the  free  and  united  Kingdom  of  Italy, 
and  when  Lombardy,  her  sister  in  captivity,  had 
been  lih)erated,   or  that  the  Kingdom  of  Italy, 


The  Germanic  Triumph  149 

having  freed  Lombardy,  could  forget  the  less 
fortunate  sister  and  allow  her  to  languish  in  the 
bondage  of  the  Hapsburgs.  Sooner  or  later  the 
Austrian  Empire  and  the  Kingdom  of  Italy  would 
come  to  blows  about  Venice. 

This  placed  France  in  a  great  difficulty,  for,  if 
these  two  States  alone  were  to  go  to  war,  it  might 
happen  that  France  would  be  compelled  either 
to  allow  all  that  she  had  achieved  in  Italy  to  be 
undone  and  spoiled,  or  else  to  intervene  again  in 
Italian  affairs,  which  was  a  very  serious  enterprise, 
as  the  events  of  1859  ^^^  i860  had  proved.  Napo- 
leon III.  had  done  his  best,  therefore,  to  favour 
the  attempts  made  on  more  than  one  occasion 
by  the  Kingdom  of  Italy  to  ransom  the  fair 
slave  of  the  Austrian  Empire  with  money,  as  was 
the  custom  in  barbarous  times.  These  attempts 
failed  because  Francis  Joseph  would  not  listen  to 
a  financial  proposal.  Arms  alone  could  decide 
who  should  have  the  right  to  possess  Venetia! 
There  was  a  danger,  therefore,  that  Italian  affairs, 
which  remained  in  a  state  of  suspense,  might 
suddenly  lead  to  a  war  for  Venice,  and  this  danger 
was  so  great  that  it  provides  an  almost  complete 
explanation  of  the  policy  of  Napoleon  III.  in 
1866.  If,  in  1859,  he  had  carried  out  his  intention 
of  freeing  Italy  from  the  Alps  to  the  Adriatic,  if 


150  Problems  of  Peace 

Austria  had  not  persisted  in  keeping  Venetia  after 
having  surrendered  Lombardy,  if  Francis  Joseph's 
narrow  and  obstinate  mind  could  have  reaHzed 
that  Austria  could  not  stand  with  one  foot  in 
Italy  but  must  either  be  mistress  there  or  leave 
the  coiuitry  altogether,  both  Austria  and  France 
would  have  been  able  to  free  themselves  much 
more  easily  from  the  net  which  was  being  so 
cunningly  spun  for  them  by  astute  Prussian 
ambition,  and  would  have  been  able  to  oppose  a 
much  more  vigorous  defence  to  Prussian  attacks. 
Fate  willed  it  otherwise.  In  1865,  when  Bis- 
marck visited  Napoleon  at  Biarritz  in  order  to 
discover  what  France  would  do  if  war  broke  out 
between  Prussia  and  Austria  owing  to  the  dispute 
which  had  begun  in  the  spring  over  the  spoils  of 
Denmark,  he  could  only  gather  from  the  vague 
and  circumspect  conversation  of  the  Emperor  that 
France  would  support  Prussia  if  Prussia  were  an 
ally  of  Italy  or — to  put  it  still  more  clearly — if 
Prussia  would  help  France  to  settle  finally  the 
Italian  Question,  which,  in  its  half -solved  state, 
was  a  thorn  in  her  side  and  a  menace  to  the  peace 
of  Europe.  Bismarck  who,  at  the  end  of  July,  had 
made  proposals  of  alliance  to  Italy,  was  delighted, 
and,  when  he  returned  from  Biarritz  to  Paris,  he 
exclaimed  in  conversation  with  the  Ambassador 


The  Germanic  Triumph  151 

Nigra,  "If  Italy  did  not  exist  it  would  be  necessary 
to  invent  her!"  Even,  however,  with  the  consent 
of  the  Emperor  it  was  no  easy  matter  for  Prussia 
to  form  an  alliance  with  Italy.  The  two  govern- 
ments thoroughly  distrusted  each  other.  Prussia 
feared  that  the  object  of  Italy  in  making  the 
bargain  was  merely  to  frighten  Austria  into  selling 
Venetia.  Italy  on  her  side  suspected  that  Prussia 
by  her  proposals  of  alliance  and  her  Vague  threats 
of  war  was  seeking  to  extort  from  Austria  the 
lion's  share  of  the  Danish  booty.  Bismarck's 
proposals  of  July,  1865,  therefore,  came  to  nothing, 
for  in  August  had  been  signed  between  Austria 
and  Prussia  the  Convention  of  Gastein  by  which 
the  quarrels  of  the  two  robbers  over  their  prey 
appeared  to  have  been  settled.  It  is  true  that 
this  convention  was  the  work,  not  of  Bismarck 
who  had  proposed  the  alliance,  but  the  King  of 
Prussia,  who,  owing  to  his  legitimist  prejudices, 
was  reluctant  to  break  with  Austria.  But  Lamar- 
mora,  then  the  head  of  the  Italian  Government, 
was  not  the  man  to  draw  subtle  distinctions 
between  the  Minister  and  his  Master;  he  became 
disgusted  by  the  frivolity  which  one  day  proposed 
alliance  against  Austria  and  the  next  day  came  to 
an  agreement  with  her,  and  returned  to  the  idea 
of  getting  Venetia  from  Austria  by  negotiation. 


152  Problems  of  Peace 

This  break  in  the  negotiations  so  much  estranged 
the  two  governments  that,  although  Napolecn 
had  declared  in  October  that  he  was  in  favour  of 
the  alliance,  nothing  more  was  said  about  it  until 
March,  1866,  when  Italy  had  definitely  ascertained 
that  it  was  impossible  to  come  to  terms  with 
Austria  and  when  new  quarrels  had  arisen  between 
Austria  and  Prussia  over  the  application  of  the 
Convention  of  Gastein.  These  quarrels  were  so 
serious  that  on  February  28th  a  conference  of 
the  highest  dignitaries  of  the  Kingdom  of  Prussia 
had  definitely  decided  to  go  to  war  if  Italy  would 
join  the  alliance.  On  this  Bismarck  again  officially 
invited  Italy  to  treat  and  tried  to  ascertain  the 
nebulous  intentions  of  Napoleon  III.,  declaring 
with  sufficient  sincerity  what  Prussia  proposed  to 
do.  Italy  did  not  wish  to  engage  in  these  negoti- 
ations without  first  coming  to  an  agreement  with 
France.  Thus  Napoleon  became  for  a  moment 
the  arbiter,  as  it  were,  of  a  proposed  alliance 
between  Prussia  and  Italy. 

What  use  did  he  make  of  this  great  power  which 
the  turn  of  events  and  the  discordant  ambitions  of 
the  Powers  had  placed  in  his  hands  ?  He  encour- 
aged Italy  to  treat  with  Prussia;  he  declared  to 
Prussia  that  France  would  require  compensations 
in  exchange  for  her  benevolent  neutrality;  but  at 


The  Germanic  Triumph  153 

the  same  time — and  here  the  history  of  what 
happens  begins  to  be  wrapped  in  mystery — he 
also  entered  into  negotiations  with  Austria.  Was 
it  Austria  or  was  it  France  who  took  the  initiative  ? 
The  point  is  obscure  and  deserves  to  be  elucidated 
by  a  close  study  of  the  archives.  If  we  may  judge 
from  the  character  of  Napoleon  III.  and  from  the 
consistent  probity  with  which  French  diplomacy 
has  dealt  with  great  affairs  in  Europe  since  the  fall 
of  Napoleon  I.  we  may  conjecture  that  it  w^as 
Austria.  Seeing  the  storm  approaching  Austria 
must  have  wished  to  ingratiate  herself  with  France, 
as  Prussia,  with  more  enterprise,  had  been  doing 
for  several  years,  and  to  try  in  this  way  to  insure 
against  Italy's  taking  part  in  the  war.  Why  did 
Napoleon  III.  refuse  to  listen  to  Austria?  He 
had  no  engagements  with  Prussia.  He  had  only 
two  anxieties,  one  that  the  Italian  Question  should 
be  finally  settled,  the  other  that,  if  one  or  other  of 
the  greater  Germanic  Powers  should  be  increased, 
France  should  receive  adequate  compensation. 
Prudence  may  therefore  have  suggested  that  it 
would  be  wise  to  sound  both  sides  before  pledging 
himself  to  either.  It  is  therefore  quite  possible 
that  when  Napoleon  III.  engaged  in  conversations 
with  Austria  while  advising  Italy  to  treat  with 
Prussia,  it  was  not  with  any  Machiavellian  design 


154  Problems  of  Peace 

of  deceiving  any  of  the  Powers  with  whom  he  was 
negotiating  but  merely  because  he  had  no  clear  and 
distinct  plan  of  his  own. 

But  from  this  moment  European  policy  seemed 
to  go  mad.  On  April  8th  there  was  signed  at 
Berlin  a  Convention  whereby  Italy  undertook  to 
fight  by  the  side  of  Prussia  if  war  broke  out  within 
three  months.  On  the  9th,  Prussia  proposed  to 
the  Diet  of  Frankfort  that  an  Assembly  should 
be  appointed  by  universal  suffrage  to  reform  the 
Federal  Constitution.  War,  therefore,  was  now 
certain.  Towards  the  end  of  April,  Austria  took 
military  measures  on  the  Italian  frontier;  the 
Italian  Government  became  anxious,  replied  by 
making  suitable  preparations,  and  referred  to 
Napoleon  III.  who  had  advised  them  to  conclude 
the  alliance  with  Prussia  and  to  Prussia  with  whom 
they  had  concluded  it.  By  the  former  the  Italian 
Government  was  reproved  for  having  acted  tim- 
orously and  hastily,  and  the  latter  replied  that 
the  Treaty  of  April  8th  obliged  Italy  to  take  arms 
if  war  broke  out  within  three  months  between 
Austria  and  Prussia,  but  did  not  oblige  Prussia 
to  fight  if  Austria  attacked  Italy !  For  some  days 
the  Italian  Government  feared  that  they  had 
fallen  into  a  deadly  trap  and  that  they  would  be 
abandoned  to  the  tender  mercies  of  Austria  with- 


The  Germanic  Triumph  155 

out  assistance.  But  lo!  on  May  5th,  Austria 
graciously  offered  Venetia  to  Italy  as  the  price  of 
her  neutrality,  and  Napoleon,  who  had  encouraged 
Italy  to  ally  herself  with  Prussia,  now  advised  her 
to  seek  an  opportunity  for  getting  out  of  her  bar- 
gain. Italy,  however,  did  not  accept,  for  she  did 
not  wish  to  perjure  herself.  Fidelity  such  as  this 
deserved  some  gratitude.  She  received  nothing 
of  the  kind.  On  May  7th  the  Prussian  Govern- 
ment sent  the  Austrian  Government  a  mild  note 
on  the  subject  of  the  disputed  Duchies  and  com- 
menced secret  negotiations  for  an  understanding 
with  Austria  on  the  basis  of  dividing  Germany 
into  two  zones,  each  reserved  for  one  or  other  of 
the  two  greater  Powers.  Austria  was  to  be  free 
to  do  what  she  liked  in  Italy.  Prussia  would  deal 
with  France,  Austria  refused  the  proffered  trea- 
son, but  on  June  12th  signed  a  secret  Treaty  with 
France  by  w^hich  she  bound  herself,  even  if  victori- 
ous in  the  war  \\dth  Prussia,  in  exchange  for  the 
promised  neutrality  of  Napoleon  III.,  to  cede 
Venetia  to  France  for  re-transfer  to  the  Kingdom 
of  Italy,  and  not  to  disturb  the  balance  of  Ger- 
many without  the  consent  of  France.  On  the 
very  same  day  Napoleon  said  to  Nigra  that  if 
war  broke  out  it  might  be  well  for  Italy  not  to 
wage  it  too  vigorously,  and  the  Italian  Govern- 


156  Problems  of  Peace 

ment  were  given  to  understand  through  the 
medium  of  the  French  Government  that  the 
Prussian  Queen  Mother  had  written  to  Francis 
Joseph  that  she  had  King  WilHam's  word  of  hon- 
our that  he  had  concluded  no  treaty  with  Italy. 
Ministers  on  both  sides  had  merely  signed  a 
convention  which  would  not  prevent  Prussia  from 
coming  to  an  agreement  with  Austria.  For  a 
moment,  all  Italy  believed  that  Bismarck  had 
mystified  Europe,  as  no  one  wished  to  believe  that 
the  King  of  Prussia  had  lied.  Meanwhile  Bis- 
marck incited  Italy  to  fire  the  train  and  bring 
about  a  casus  belli. 

Had  everybody  gone  mad?  No,  but  no  Govern- 
ment really  knew  what  it  wanted.  In  Prussia, 
one  party  wanted  war,  another,  more  numerous 
and  powerful,  did  not  want  it.  In  Austria  one 
party  wished  to  give  way  in  Italy  and  come  to  an 
agreement  with  France  in  order  to  rebuild  Austrian 
fortunes  in  Germany,  while  another  wished  to  be 
supreme  both  in  Germany  and  in  Italy.  Italy, 
with  good  reason,  had  little  faith  in  Prussia; 
Prussia  looked  on  Italy  with  suspicion.  In  the 
midst  of  this  confusion  Napoleon  III.,  with  his 
fixed  idea  of  drawing  the  teeth  of  the  Italian 
Question,  had  at  first,  since  Austria  persisted  in 
keeping  Venetia,  encouraged  Italy  to  make  alii- 


The  Germanic  Triumph  157 

ance  with  Prussia  and  had  given  the  latter  to 
understand  that  she  must   pay  adequate   com- 
pensation for  her  aggrandizement.     When  Austria 
had  become  aware  of  her  danger  and,  whether  in 
good  or  bad  faith,   had  shown  conciliatory  dis- 
positions, he  had  negotiated  with  Austria.     We 
know  very  little  about  these  negotiations,  but  it  is 
certain  that,  as  soon  as  Austria  pledged  herself 
to  evacuate  Italy  whatever  might  be  the  result 
of  the  war,  Napoleon  III.  first  tried  to  withdraw 
the  Kingdom  of  Italy  from  the  alliance  which  he 
had  encouraged  and  then  to  bring  it  about  that 
Italy's  intervention  in  the  war  should  be  as  harm- 
less as  possible  to  Austria,  while,  as  regards  com- 
pensation, he  continued  to  manoeuvre  between  the 
two  leading  Germanic  Powers,  not  knowing  which 
would    be  the  stronger.     This  was  a  very  wise 
plan  if  behind  it  there  was  the  resolute  intention 
of  flying  to  the  rescue  of  the  weaker ;  it  was  a  very 
foolish  one  if  it  merely  concealed  the  hope  of 
snatching  some  advantage  from  the  wars  of  other 
States  without  risking  anything  himself. 

In  the  midst  of  these  great  perplexities,  un- 
certainties, deceits,  and  duplicities,  Europe  was 
dumbfounded  to  see  the  army  of  Prussia,  which 
had  slumbered  for  half  a  century,  encamp  itself  in 
Saxony  and  Silesia  within  a  week,  force  an  entrance 


158  Problems  of  Peace 

into  Bohemia  under  the  eyes  of  an  Austrian  Army 
of  200,000  men,  drive  back  one  after  another  all 
the  army  corps  which  sought  to  bar  its  way,  and 
on  July  3d  at  Sadowa  inflict  a  disastrous  defeat 
on  the  old  Austrian  Army,  putting  20,000  men  hors 
de  combat  and  capturing  as  many  prisoners.  How 
an  army  which,  six  years  before,  was  regarded  as 
an  outworn  weapon  rusted  with  idleness  had  been 
able  at  the  first  onset  to  inflict  such  discomfiture 
on  the  old  Austrian  Army  which  since  1848  had 
had  plenty  of  opportunity  of  bringing  itself  up  to 
date,  is  one  of  the  riddles  with  which  history 
delights  to  confound  human  reason  when  it  seeks 
to  investigate  the  causes  of  human  destinies.  In 
any  case,  the  Austrian  Army  had  lost  a  battle  but 
not  the  war.  The  course  to  be  followed  in  the 
resulting  difficulty  seemed  clear  to  those  in  the 
French  Emperor's  councils  at  Paris.  Austria 
must  immediately  satisfy  Italy,  and  France  must 
mobilize  her  army  on  the  Rhine  and  impose  her 
mediation  with  forces  capable  of  subduing  Prussia 
if  Prussia  dared  to  resist.  Austria  still  had  men 
and  arms  in  abundance;  all  of  the  Prussian 
forces  were  collected  in  Bohemia.  If  the  French 
army  were  to  be  deployed  on  the  frontier  Prussia 
would  be  compelled  to  accept  a  just  peace.  For 
the    moment    Austria    seemed    to    have    learned 


The  Germanic  Triumph  159 

the  lesson  of  defeat,  for,  at  a  Council  held  at 
Schoenbrunn  on  the  morning  of  the  4th,  it  was 
decided  to  offer  Venetia  to  Napoleon  III.  and  to 
ask  for  his  mediation,  which  in  fact  was  offered 
the  same  evening  to  the  King  of  Italy  and  the 
King  of  Prussia. 

France  and  Austria  gave  in  too  easily  to  the 
bewilderment  caused  by  this  remarkable,  resound- 
ing, but  wholly  unexpected  victory  of  the  Prussian 
arms.  It  is  probable  that  Prussia  would  have  had 
the  same  destiny  even  if  she  had  been  conquered 
at  Sadowa.  None  of  the  governments  concerned 
had  the  strength  to  impose  on  their  peoples  the 
sacrifices  of  a  long  war,  because  they  were  founded 
on  a  too  narrowly  oligarchical  basis.  Francis 
Joseph  had  re-established  absolutism,  which  meant 
government  by  a  very  small  aulic  clique,  either 
German  or  Germanized,  whose  will  it  was  to  domi- 
nate a  congeries  of  diverse  and  often  hostile  na- 
tionalities, the  educated  middle  class  and  the 
mass  of  the  people.  This  little  oligarchy  could 
impose  itself  by  force  and  prestige  on  the  subject 
races  and  on  the  majority,  but  it  could  not  extort 
from  either  a  protracted  effort  or  great  sacrifices. 
The  personal  government  of  Napoleon  III.  also 
had  begun  to  weaken,  owing  to  the  weariness  and 
ill-health  of  the  Emperor,  the  difficulties  in  which 


i6o  Problems  of  Peace 

the  Empire  had  become  entangled,  and  growing 
opposition  from  within. 

Thus  the  destinies  of  Etirope  were  settled  for 
two  generations  between  sunrise  and  sunset  on  one 
day  of  battle.  On  August  5th,  the  French  Emperor 
presided  over  a  great  council  held  to  decide 
whether  his  mediation  should  be  armed  or  pacific. 
There  was  a  long  discussion  between  the  party 
of  prudence  and  the  party  of  boldness.  At  first 
Napoleon  seemed  to  incline  towards  audacity, 
but  not  for  long,  for  he  soon  fell  into  his  usual 
hesitation,  procrastination,  and  self-delusion,  and 
so  let  the  favourable  moment  escape.  New 
compUcations  arose  in  Italy  where  the  war  against 
Austria  had  hitherto  been  far  from  successful. 
The  Italian  army  had  imdergone,  not  a  true  defeat 
but  a  reparable  reverse,  at  Custozza  on  June  24th, 
and  the  Government  was  taking  the  necessary 
steps  to  repair  it  when,  on  July  4th,  the  news 
arrived  that  Austria  had  ceded  Venetia  to  France 
and  that  Napoleon  III.  had  offered  mediation. 
Both  Government  and  people  in  consternation  were 
agreed  that  the  war  should  go  on,  notwithstanding 
the  cession  and  the  mediation,  for  they  well  knew 
that  the  Austrian  offer  did  not  include  the  Tren- 
tino.  But  Bismarck  knew  how  to  make  an  in- 
strument   even    of    this    generous    exasperation, 


The  Germanic  Triumph  i6i 

wherewith  to  deceive  both  his  ally  and  his  enemy. 
He  kept  France  in  check  by  promising  to  accept 
mediation  and  to  conclude  an  armistice  immedi- 
ately, making  at  the  same  time  glowing  promises 
of  compensation.  He  incited  Italy  to  continue 
the  war  with  all  her  strength,  swearing  that  it 
was  the  intention  of  the  Prussian  Government  to 
fight  to  the  last  drop  of  blood.  He  then  turned  to 
Austria  and  tried  to  frighten  her  with  the  threat  of 
a  war  d,  outrance  from  Italy  and  to  reassure  her  by 
offering  moderate  peace  terms.  Austria  would 
cede  to  Italy  Venetia  only,  and  no  territory  to 
Prussia.  She  would  have  to  agree  to  the  dis- 
solution of  the  Germanic  Confederation  and 
recognize  the  new  Northern  Confederation  in 
which  Austria  would  not  be  included.  Prussia 
would  receive  Schleswig  and  Holstein  and  be  per- 
mitted to  absorb  in  North  Germany  the  territories 
of  Hanover,  the  Electorate  of  Hesse,  the  Duchy 
of  Nassau,  and  Frankfort. 

So  long  as  Austria  had  hopes  of  assistance 
from  France  she  was  deaf  to  these  blandishments, 
but,  when  she  knew  for  certain  that  Napoleon  III. 
did  not  mean  to  threaten  seriously  because  he 
was  afraid  of  war,  she  began  to  lend  an  ear.  France 
on  her  side  grew  weaker  and  more  hesitating  the 
more   Austria   inclined   to   peace,    and   the   two 


1 62  Problems  of  Peace 

governments  which  united  would  have  been  an 
invincible  force,  drifted  apart  in  isolated  weakness 
and  were  subdued  by  the  ambitions  and  implacable 
energy  which  had  planned  the  war.  By  flattering 
and  threatening  each  in  turn  Bismarck  succeeded 
between  July  loth  and  July  226.  in  getting 
Napoleon  and  Francis  Joseph  to  consent  to  the 
peace  he  wanted ;  on  July  22d  he  arranged  a  five 
days'  truce  with  Austria,  and  on  the  26th  the 
Armistice  of  Nikolsburg  was  signed.  Italy,  his 
ally,  was  not  consulted  or  even  informed !  On  the 
contrary,  on  July  22d,  the  very  day  on  which  the 
first  truce  was  signed,  the  Prussian  General  Staff 
was  urging  Italy  to  continue  the  war  vigorously! 
When  the  Armistice  of  Nikolsburg  was  concluded 
Napoleon  III.  woke  up;  he  understood  that  he  had 
been  guilty  of  weakness  and  irresolution,  he  wished 
to  regain  the  time  and  the  advantage  he  had  lost, 
and  he  claimed  the  compensation  at  which  he  had 
so  often  hinted.  It  was  too  late!  France  could 
no  longer  count  on  Austria  and  Prussia  knew  that 
Napoleon  would  not  make  war  alone  when  he  had 
not  ventured  to  threaten  it  when  Austria  was  in 
arms  and  ready  to  help  him.  Compensation  was 
refused. 

So  it  fell  out  that  once  again  the  Italian  Question 
was  not  fully  solved,  because  Prussia  had  made 


The  Germanic  Triumph  163 

peace  without  consulting  Italy,  and  she  had  to  be 

content    with    what    Prussia    and    Austria   were 

pleased  to  give  her.     She  was  denied  the  Trentino 

— a  land  which  is  purely  Italian  and  the  key  to 

the  defences  of  the  Valley  of  the  Po — and  Austria 

kept  enough  of  Friuli  to  serve  as  a  bastion  from 

which  she  could  swoop  down  on  the  defenceless 

plain.     Thus  the  German  race  could  boast  once 

more  of  brandishing  a  threatening  sword  in  the 

eyes  of  the  world.     Prussia  as  increased  by  the 

territories  she  had  annexed  now  counted  about 

twenty-four  millions  of  inhabitants,  and  had  united 

under  her  sceptre  in  one  confederation  twenty-one 

other  States  whose  population  amounted  to  six 

millions.     She   therefore  had   at   her   disposal    a 

standing  army  of  more  than  300,000  men  and  could 

mobilize  for  war  more  than  900,000.     Further, 

by  secret  treaties  concluded  in  1866,  the  States  of 

South  Germany,  the  Kingdoms  of  Wiirttemberg 

and  Bavaria,  the  Grand  Duchies  of  Baden  and 

Hesse,  had  pledged  themselves  to  place  their  forces 

at  the  disposal  of  the  King  of  Prussia  in  case 

of  war.     Bismarck  was  now  master  of  Prussia  and 

therefore  of  Germany.    In  the  presence  of  Prussia's 

victory  and  the  hopes  it  raised  for  the  future,  all 

opposition  from  the  legitimist  prejudices  of  the 

King  to  the  opposition  of  the  democratic  parties, 


1 64  Problems  of  Peace 

from  the  spirit  of  particularism  to  the  jealousy  of 
the  minor  States — all  vanished.  In  the  nation,  ine- 
briated by  its  first  victory,  there  was  a  rapid  growth 
of  cupidity,  ambition,  and  audacity,  and  four  years 
were  enough  for  Bismarck's  preparations  to  attack 
France  in  order  to  create  a  German  Empire  on  the 
ruins  of  the  Empire  of  France  and  to  conquer  the 
hegemony  of  Europe. 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE  GERMAN   PEACE  AND  THE  GERMANIZATION  OF 

EUROPE 

(187O-I914) 

The  war  of  1870  is  yet  another  of  the  riddles 
with  which  history  is  pleased  to  confound  the  in- 
quirer into  the  shaping  of  human  destiny.     It  fol- 
lowed from  the  first  the  precedents  of  the  war  of 
1866.     This  time  also  the  preparations  were  con- 
cealed behind  a  veil  of  reassuring  words.     Once 
again  the  aggressor  did  everything  possible  to  dis- 
tract his  adversary  by  making  him  believe  up  to 
the  last  moment  that  a  compromise  was  possible, 
by  isolating  him,  and  by  distracting,  flattering,  or 
terrifying  all  those  who  could  have  come  to  his 
assistance.     Once  again  the  adversary  was  over- 
powered and  struck  down,  not  as  before  by  one, 
but  by  three  or  four  resolute  blows,  in  the  course 
of  six  weeks,  and  the  nations  of  Europe  were  so 
completely  paralysed  by  amazement  at  this  sud- 
den catastrophe  that  they  remained  speechless  and 

165 


1 66  Problems  of  Peace 

impotent  in  its  presence.  If  the  men  who  governed 
Europe  in  1870  could  not  be  expected  to  divine  the 
future  they  should  at  least  have  remembered  the 
past  and  profited  by  recent  experience.  How  was 
it  that  they  allowed  themselves  to  be  surprised  a 
second  time,  and  in  the  same  way,  by  the  same 
ambition,  after  only  four  years?  Why  did  the 
nations  at  the  outset  of  the  war  which  was  to 
decide  their  destiny  look  on  with  folded  arms? 
Were  they  so  much  terrified  by  the  German  vic- 
tories that  they  could  not  fnove,  even  when  the 
victors  proposed  to  cut  from  the  body  of  France 
two  masses  of  living  flesh,  Alsace  and  Lorraine, 
and  to  impose  a  monstrous  indemnity? 

Any  one  who  studies  the  war  of  1870  as  a  merely 
military  fact  or  a  series  of  strategical  and  tactical 
combinations  carried  out  by  the  two  armies,  will 
never  succeed  in  solving  this  riddle.  France  was 
attacked,  exactly  as  the  wolf  attacked  the  lamb  in 
the  fable,  on  the  pretext  that  either  now,  or  a  year 
hence,  or  in  ten  years,  or  in  a  century,  she  would 
certainly  attack  Prussia  if  Prussia  did  not  spring 
suddenly  at  her  throat.  The  Germans  them- 
selves admitted  this,  not  without  complacent 
smiles,  as  soon  as  victory  had  relieved  them  of  the 
burden  of  the  war.  The  intrigues  which  led  to  the 
candidature  of  a  Hohcnzollei-n  for  the  Throne  of 


The  German  Peace  167 

Spain,  the  laborious  diplomatic  negotiations  of 
which  this  candidature  was  the  subject,  the  dupli- 
city exhibited  by  Prussia,  the  dinner  at  which 
Bismarck  in  the  presence  of  Marshal  von  Moltke 
and  General  von  Roon — and  to  their  great  delight 
— altered  the  dispatch  which  was  destined  to  be 
known  in  the  chronicle  of  human  wickedness  as 
"the  Ems  forgery,"  are  the  commonplaces  of 
history.  How  was  it,  then,  that  the  world  changed 
sides  and  reserved  all  its  sympathies  for  the  ag- 
gressor and  cried  to  the  lamb  weltering  in  its  gore 
that  it  was  rightly  served  for  having  provoked  the 
wolf,  while  it  applauded  the  wolf  for  its  gallant 
deed? 

It  is  equally  difficult  to  explain  why  the  victim 
succumbed  to  the  assault  of  the  aggressor  in  less 
than  two  months  though  in  possession  of  forces 
which  should  have  sufficed  for  a  very  prolonged 
defence.  The  invincible  excellence  of  the  Prus- 
sian army  which  the  world  has  admired  for  so  many 
years  is  a  discovery  made  by  Europe  after  it  had 
won  the  victory  which  it  was  antedated  to  explain. 
In  1870  the  French  army  may  have  been  some- 
what out  of  date,  but  the  Prussian  army  was 
still  partly  an  improvisation  of  the  previous  ten 
years.  After  weighing  the  respective  merits  and  de- 
fects, experts  were  of  opinion  that  the  two  armies 


1 68  Problems  of  Peace 

which  were  much  the  same  in  numbers  were  about 
equal  in  value.  If  the  Prussian  artillery  and  sani- 
tary services  were  better,  the  French  had  better  in- 
fantry and  a  better  commissariat.  The  Prus- 
sian army  was  better  led,  but  the  French  did  not 
lack  capable  generals  whom  a  strong  government 
could  have  substituted  for  the  less  efficient  ones 
before  it  was  too  late.  The  fact  that  the  French 
soldiers  served  for  five  or  seven  years  was  regarded 
by  the  Germans  themselves  as  a  great  advantage 
for  their  adversaries.  In  fact  the  forces  of  the  two 
States  were  in  a  balance.  Why  then  was  it  that, 
instead  of  having  to  sustain  the  long,  bitter,  and 
difficult  struggle  which  most  people  expected,  the 
Germans  passed  from  one  victory  to  another  until 
they  appeared  before  Paris  two  months  after  the 
declaration  of  war? 

The  war  of  1870  is  an  insoluble  enigma  to 
any  one — be  he  historian,  strategist,  or  statesman 
— who  does  not  understand  that  it  was  the  tragic 
denouement  of  the  political  crisis  which  began  in 
Europe  with  the  Revolution  of  1848.  In  that  war 
France  was  beaten,  not  so  much  by  the  arms  of  her 
enemies  as  by  the  political  weakness  which  had 
been  imdermining  her  ever  since  the  fatal  June 
days  when  she  lost  confidence  in  the  new  principle 
of  authority  then   enthroned,  without  acquiring 


The  German  Peace  169 

an  unwavering  confidence  in  the  old  principles  of 
authority  already  so  often  discredited,  sent  into 
exile,  and  once  more  recalled  to  a  kind  of  semi- 
activity,  in  order  to  gain  time.  From  this  per- 
plexity arose  the  curious  reign  of  Napoleon  III., 
weak  like  all  the  children  of  perplexity  and  fear. 
In  the  course  of  seventeen  years  it  grew  weaker 
still,  owing  to  the  growing  doubt  of  its  own 
legitimacy,  the  renewed  difficulties  at  home  and 
abroad  which  had  wearied  it  out,  the  too  numerous 
enterprises  attempted  rather  with  noble  objects 
than  with  adequate  means,  and  finally  by  the 
exhaustion  of  the  man  who  had  every  day  to  con- 
trive a  new  mask  of  Hercules  to  disguise  the 
feebleness  of  his  government.  That  government 
was  not  even  capable  of  using  to  good  effect  the 
weapons  it  possessed, — it  entered  the  arena  tired 
before  the  fight  began;  it  had  not  the  wit  to 
entrust  the  command  to  men  of  approved  capa- 
city; it  hesitated  between  various  plans  of  cam- 
paign— it  would  and  it  would  not — ;  it  nursed 
favourable  opportunities  and  failed  to  enforce 
obedience,  and  at  the  first  reverses  it  lost  its  head 
and  uncovered  both  flank  and  front  to  the  enemy. 
Europe,  terrified  but  unmoved  and  mute,  looked 
on  at  the  butchery  because,  after  1848,  in  the  wars, 
the  diplomatic  conflicts,  and  the  civil  struggles 


1 70  Problems  of  Peace 

by  which  she  had  been  divided  and  disturbed, 
she  had  lost  sight  of  her  common  needs  and  her 
common  interests.  Austria  understood  the  dan- 
ger and  several  times  sounded  the  European 
Powers  to  see  if  there  was  no  way  of  coming  to  an 
agreement  to  impose  a  check  on  the  conqueror. 
But  Russia,  remembering  Poland,  saw  everything 
through  Prussian  spectacles  and  would  not  listen  to 
reason.  She  was  helped  in  this  attitude  by  Eng- 
land who,  always  gnawed  by  jealousy  of  France, 
always  occupied  in  her  exact  but  petty  calcu- 
lations, again  did  nothing  herself  and  prevented 
others  from  doing  anything.  Italy  on  her  side 
remembered  Mentana.  .  .  .  Thus  Austria's  ef- 
forts failed.  Italy's  idea  was  rather  to  seize  the 
opportunity  of  taking  possession  of  Rome,  and 
Russia's  to  proclaim  authoritatively,  without  ask- 
ing the  permission  of  the  other  Powers,  that  the 
second  article  of  the  Treaty  of  Paris  was  cancelled. 
Prussia,  on  the  other  hand,  which  at  the  beginning 
of  1866  was  still  a  little  State  of  eighteen  millions 
of  inhabitants  and  the  smallest  of  the  Great  Pow- 
ers of  Europe,  could  boast  that  in  less  than  five 
years  she  had  humiliated  Austria,  dismembered 
France,  and  founded  in  the  heart  of  Europe  under 
the  form  of  a  Confederation  the  last  of  the  Em- 
pires which  issued  from  the  historical   upheaval 


The  German  Peace  171 

of  the  French  Revolution.  So  rapid  a  growth,  so 
startling  a  surprise  had  never  before  been  seen  in 
Europe. 

Such  was  the  will  of  Fate.  Are  we  therefore  to 
conclude  that  in  1870  Divine  Right  won  by  force 
of  arms  yet  another  victory  over  the  spirit  of 
Revolution?  It  cannot  be  denied  that  the  Prus- 
sian victory  did  constitute  a  sort  of  half  revenge 
for  the  revolutionary  successes  of  1848.  A  king 
who  believed  himself  to  be  the  Lord's  anointed, 
and  who  had  abandoned  none  of  the  rights  which 
the  Revolution  had  most  tenaciously  disputed  with 
sovereigns,  such  as  the  right  to  summon  and  dis- 
miss ministers,  to  make  war  and  peace,  to  conclude 
alliances;  a  minister  who  had  left  nothing  to 
Parliament  but  the  business  of  paying  the  reckon- 
ing for  his  policy;  a  privileged  aristocracy,  mili- 
tarist and  bound  to  the  sovereign,  had  succeeded 
in  dragging  the  educated  and  the  middle  classes 
resolutely  united  with  the  masses,  into  a  great  war, 
and  in  conquering  France,  weakened  as  she  was  by 
the  irreconcilable  struggle  between  the  new  de- 
mocratic idealogy  and  the  ancient  principles  of 
authority.  What  an  argument  for  those  who,  in 
German}''  and  elsewhere,  opposed  the  parHament- 
ary  system,  liberal  and  democratic  doctrines,  the 
principle   of   nationality,    and  the  other  idealist 


172  Problems  of  Peace 

theories  according  to  which  force  might  be  dis- 
armed by  depriving  it  of  its  sovereign  rights  over 
the  destiny  of  nations ! 

The  new  German  Empire  was  in  fact  very  ready 
to  pose  as  the  champion  of  law  and  order  against 
revolutionary  Europe.  Bismarck  from  time  to 
time  gave  himself  the  airs  of  a  new  Mettemich,  and 
the  parties  usually  styled  Conservative  did  their 
best  all  over  Europe  to  make  the  most  of  the 
German  successes  for  their  own  purposes.  The 
victory  of  Germany,  however,  was  not  followed 
by  a  period  of  reaction  which  could  be  even  re- 
motely compared  to  that  produced  by  the  Holy 
Alliance.  The  classes  and  the  parties  which  pro- 
fessed Liberal  opinions  were  now  so  strong  all  over 
Europe  except  in  Russia,  that  not  even  the  German 
sword  could  lay  them  low  again.  Nor  were  replies 
wanting  to  the  argument  provided  by  the  German 
victory.  In  the  government  of  Napoleon  III. 
the  spirit  of  the  Revolution  had  been  mixed  with 
many  elements  surviving  from  the  ancien  regime, 
and  it  was  to  this  contamination  and  not  to  the 
spirit  of  the  Revolution  itself  that  democratic 
logic  attributed  the  defeat  of  France.  There  was 
even  more  to  be  said.  Though  William  T.  figured 
in  Europe  as  the  standard  bearer  of  Divine  Right, 
the  empire  which  he  founded  had  not  scrupled  or 


The  German  Peace  173 

feared  to  include  Universal  Suffrage  among  the 
instruments  of  government,  recognizing  in  the  will 
of  the  People  the  principle  and  the  fount  of  author- 
ity of  the  Imperial  Parliament;  and  even  Repub- 
lics and  Democracies  were  now  to  seek  in  Prussia 
models  for  certain  institutions,  such  as  universal 
and  compulsory  military  service  and  education, 
which,  after  the  German  victories,  democracy 
itself  was  inclined  to  recognize  as  its  own  legiti- 
mate children  culpabl}^  abandoned  by  their 
mother  and  adopted  by  an  astute  Monarchy. 
After  1870  the  system  whereby  many  of  the  richer 
classes  even  in  France  had  escaped  Military  service 
by  paying  for  a  substitute  was  abolished,  and  the 
fable  that  the  real  victor  at  Sadowa  and  Sedan 
had  been  the  elementary  schoolmaster  reconciled 
to  public  education  many  governments  which  had 
previously  feared  it  as  the  first  step  towards  associ- 
ating the  masses  with  the  ruling  of  the  State. 
Again  it  could  not  be  denied  that  after  the  war  of 
1866  the  Emperor  of  Austria  had  been  compelled 
to  reconcile  himself  with  Liberal  opinion  in  Hun- 
gary by  granting  a  Constitution  with  two  Parlia- 
ments, one  at  Vienna  and  one  at  Buda  Pest,  that 
in  1870  the  Empire  of  Napoleon  III.  had  fallen 
in  France,  and  the  Temporal  Power  of  the  Popes  in 
Italy.     Germany's  wars  had  in  fact  had  the  double 


174  Problems  of  Peace 

effect  of  uprooting  the  idea  of  Divine  Right  out- 
side the  Germanic  world  and  stimulating  it  within 
that  world. 

The  victories  of  the  German  army  did  not  so 
much  create  a  new  opposition  between  the  prin- 
ciples of  the  Holy  Alliance  and  the  ideas  of  1848 
as  confuse  both  in  the  mind  of  Europe,  so  that 
peoples  and  governments  began  to  lose  all  clear 
consciousness  of  the  premises  and  the  conclusions 
of  either  system.  To  the  internal  confusion  in  all 
the  States  was  now  added  their  individual  isolation 
and  a  universal  fear  of  war.  It  was  now  clear  that 
there  no  longer  existed  in  Europe  even  the  shadow 
of  a  public  law  which  would  protect  innocent 
weakness,  that  any  State  could  at  pleasure  attack 
its  neighbour  on  any  specious  pretext,  annex  its 
territories,  impose  indemnities,  and  humiliate  it, 
in  the  certainty  that,  if  it  proved  to  be  the  stronger, 
it  would  be  admired  and  applauded  by  all  the 
world.  How  was  one  to  know  who  were  friends 
or  who  foes?  What  power  save  the  power  of  the 
sword  could  be  trusted  to  protect  a  nation's  treas- 
ures against  the  cupidity  and  the  ambition  of 
others?  The  years  which  followed  1870  were  for 
Europe  years  of  mutual  distrust,  of  continual 
alarms,  and  anxious  vigilance. 

In  Russia  the  Court  and  the  Government  con- 


The  German  Peace  175 

tinned  to  the  German  Empire  the  friendship  they 
had  lavished  on  Prussia,  but  not  without  regret- 
fully recognizing  that  the  German  Empire  was  a 
more  dangerous  neighbour  than  the  Germanic 
Confederation  had  been.  Austria  distrusted  Rus- 
sia and  looked  with  rancour  and  suspicion  on  both 
Italy  and  Germany.  She  feared  that  Italy  might 
attack  her  in  order  to  secure  the  "unredeemed" 
territories  as  they  now  began  to  be  called.  Italy 
on  her  side  was  afraid  that  Austria  might  attack 
any  day  in  order  to  revenge  on  her  the  defeats  she 
had  sustained  at  the  hands  of  Prussia.  For  she 
could  now  no  longer  rely  on  French  assistance, 
partly  because  the  old  bonds  of  the  Kingdom  of 
Italy  with  France  had  been  broken  by  the  fall 
of  the  Empire ;  partly  because  the  Republic,  though 
not  without  interest  in  Italian  affairs,  was  not 
involved  in  them  as  the  former  regime  had  been 
and  was  fully  occupied  with  the  reconstruction 
of  France;  partly  again  because  the  neutrality 
observed  by  Italy  during  the  war  and  the  con- 
quest of  Rome  had  estranged  a  portion  of  the 
French  nation.  There  were  those  in  France  who 
suspected  Italy  of  an  inclination  to  make  war  on 
her  allies  of  1859  as  there  were  some  in  Italy  who 
accused  France  of  wishing  to  attack  Italy  in  order 
to  restore  the  Pope.     France,  finally,  was  occupied 


176  Problems  of  Peace 

in  giving  a  stable  balance  to  the  Republic  but  she 
was  full  of  hatred  towards  Germany,  suspicious 
of  Italy,  uncertain  of  Austria  and  Russia.  She 
desired  and  at  the  same  time  feared  a  new  war 
with  Germany,  and  was  preparing  for  it  as  if  it 
might  break  out  any  day. 

There  was,  in  fact,  a  universal  conviction  and  a 
universal  fear  that  the  German  victories  might 
be  the  seed  and  the  beginning  of  new  wars  greater 
and  more  terrible  than  the  old,  and  all  men  were 
doubtful  of  the  present  and  fearful  for  the  future. 
There  was  good  reason.  Like  all  the  empires 
which  emerged  from  the  great  historic  upheaval  of 
the  Revolution  the  German  Empire  had  no  other 
title  of  legitimacy  but  force.  It  is  said — to  the 
great  surprise  of  some  people — that  on  the  day  on 
which  William  I.  was  proclaimed  German  Emperor 
at  the  Chateau  of  Versailles  by  the  Sovereign 
and  the  Princes  of  Germany,  he  was  in  a  very  bad 
humour  about  his  new  title  and  so  angry  with  his 
famous  minister  who  had  conferred  it  on  him,  that 
he  would  not  speak  to  him.  But  if  it  be  remem- 
bered that  William  I.  had  fought  the  first  Napoleon 
and  had  served  the  Holy  Alliance,  if  it  be  under- 
stood by  what  a  tragic  contradiction  authority 
when  it  strengthens  itself  must  divest  itself  of  its 
legitimate  titles,  and  on  the  other  hand  when  it 


The  German  Peace  177 

wishes  to  seem  legitimate  must  weaken  and 
emasculate  itself  in  its  respect  for  legality,  it  will 
be  clear  that  the  old  monarch,  alone  among  the 
festive  crowd  on  that  day  of  triumph,  saw  the 
writing  on  the  walls  of  the  ancient  castle  of  the 
French  Kings  which  portended  death  to  his  new 
empire. 

.  The  old  man  could  still  believe  and  proclaim  in 
good  faith  that  his  people  regarded  the  modest 
Crown  of  Prussia  as  a  gift  of  God.  But  how  could 
it  be  pretended  that  his  new  and  more  splendid 
Imperial  Crown  was  God-given  when  it  had  in 
fact  been  fabricated  and  tendered  to  him  by  his 
companions  in  arms  before  all  the  world  at  the 
end  of  his  fortunate  adventure  in  France?  This 
crown  had  been  the  prize  of  victory,  and,  as  defeat 
might  deprive  him  of  it  again,  it  was  necessary  to 
defend  it  against  the  rancour  and  the  vengeance 
of  the  two  great  States  which  German  arms  had 
conquered,  against  the  jealousy,  the  distrust,  and 
the  fear  of  the  other  Powers  of  Europe  which  had 
been  three  times  surprised  by  the  audacity  of 
Prussia.  This  obligation  may  well  have  seemed 
a  dangerous  one  to  an  old  King  who,  like  all  his 
generation,  had  been  brought  up  to  distinguish 
more  accurately  than  his  juniors  the  two  elements 
of  authority  which  the  nineteenth  century  sought 


12 


178  Problems  of  Peace 

to  confuse,  namely,  legality  and  force.  The 
world  was  right  in  thinking  that  the  new  Empire 
would  have  to  defend  by  force  what  it  had  gained 
by  force,  and  that  its  example  would  be  the 
source  of  new  wars,  whenever  a  powerful  State 
felt  itself  to  be  strong  enough  to  despoil  a  weaker 
neighbour. 

The  course  of  events  appeared  to  make  sport  of 
these  alarms.  Once  more,  as  at  the  beginning  of 
the  century,  the  war  gave  rise  to  a  long  peace. 
The  new  peace,  however,  was  not  imposed  on  each 
State  by  the  voluntary  agreement  of  the  others. 
It  was  the  result  of  an  inextricable  mixture  of  fear, 
distrust,  and  suspicion.  It  was  based  on  alliances 
which  lasted  long  but  had  little  sincerity,  on 
simulated  friendships,  and  hidden  enmities.  It  is 
necessary  that  we  should  clearly  understand 
what  was  the  precise  nature  of  the  "German 
Peace,"  which  for  forty  years  was  at  once  the  vital 
necessity  and  the  mortal  torment  of  Europe,  if  we 
are  to  grasp  the  meaning  of  the  present  crisis  in 
Western  civilization. 

When  they  had  won  their  third  war  William  I. 
and  Bismarck,  terrified  by  their  own  good  fortune, 
and  fearing  the  vengeance  of  the  vanquished, 
thought  of  nothing  but  obtaining  a  peace  which 
could  secure  the  rich  booty  of  the  war,  and  took 


The  German  Peace  i79 

measures  to  impose  on  Europe  a  peace  which  ma^'- 
well  be  called  German,  not  only  because  it  was  dic- 
tated by  Germany,  but  because  in  the  means  em- 
ployed it  is  easy  to  recognize  the  reckless  extrava- 
gance of  the  Germ.anic  spirit.  Bismarck's  first 
thought  was  to  prevent  a  coalition  of  the  two  victims 
of  his  policy,  France  and  Austria.  He  therefore  re- 
conciled himself  with  Austria,  the  one  who  had  suf- 
fered the  less  cruel  blow,  and  whose  commimity  of 
language  and  culture  with  Germany  and  a  similarity 
of  institutions  made  an  understanding  easier.  At 
the  same  time,  however,  he  did  not  wish  to  quarrel 
with  Russia  on  whom  he  relied  in  case  Austria  and 
France  should  imite  to  attack  Germany.  Thus 
from  1870  till  1878  he  did  all  he  could  to  make 
friends  with  Austria  without  offending  Russia 
who  distrusted  Austria,  and  to  establish  an  alli- 
ance between  the  three  Northern  Empires  which 
would  have  a  distant  resemblance  to  the  Holy 
Alliance.  The  war  which  broke  out  between 
Russia  and  Turkey  in  1878  envenomed  too  greatly 
the  mutual  hatred  and  suspicion  of  Russia  and 
Austria-Hungary  and  compelled  Bismarck  to 
choose  between  them.  Despite  her  many  weak- 
nesses Austria  would  have  been  much  stronger 
than  Russia  on  any  European  battle-field.  Bis- 
marck, therefore,  in  order  to  prevent  an  alHance 


i8o  Problems  of  Peace 

between  Austria  and  France  could  not  hesitate  to 
renounce  Russian  assistance.  Moreover  an  alli- 
ance with  Austria,  to  the  Germans  in  the  two 
empires,  had  the  aspect  of  a  final  reconciliation  of 
the  whole  Germanic  world,  the  expiation  of  the 
fratricide  committed  in  1866. 

In  1879  Bismarck  finally  succeeded  in  persuad- 
ing Austria,  in  her  anxiety  about  Russia,  to  con- 
clude the  alliance  which  pledged  Germany  to  help 
Austria  in  the  event  of  a  Russian  attack,  but  did 
not  pledge  Austria  to  help  Germany  if  attacked 
by  France.  The  conqueror  must  have  been  in 
dire  need  of  the  assistance  of  the  conquered  to 
agree  to  such  terms!  Fearing,  however,  that 
Austria  might  use  the  alliance  in  order  to  aggrand- 
ize herself  in  the  Balkans  or  in  the  East  or  to  attack 
Russia,  and  that  Russia  might  be  driven  by  his 
compact  with  Austria  to  ally  herself  with  France, 
Bismarck  in  1884  concluded  with  Russia  a  secret 
agreement  which  is  famous  under  the  name  of 
the  Reinsurance  Treaty.  By  this  treaty  Germany 
pledged  herself  to  neutrality  if  Austria  attacked 
Russia;  Russia  on  the  other  hand  promised  not 
to  intervene  if  France  provoked  a  new  war  with 
Germany. 

It  is  not  surprising  that  Austria  should  have 
consented   to  a  reconciliation  with  Germany  on 


The  German  Peace  i8i 

these  terms.  How  could  the  House  of  Austria, 
always  anxious  to  aggrandize  itself,  refuse  an  alli- 
ance which  provided  gratuitously  a  powerful  ally 
in  the  event  of  a  Russian  attack?  The  Austrian 
Emperor  must  have  been  in  mortal  terror  of 
another  disastrous  war  when  his  empire  was  al- 
ready beginning  to  break  up  as  the  result  of  the  de- 
feats of  1 859-1 866  and  the  rudimentary  liberties 
which  had  been  conceded  by  the  new  constitutions 
extorted  by  the  agitations  of  the  nationalities. 
Force  had  created  the  Austrian  Empire  during  the 
Napoleonic  wars  by  assembling  round  the  States, 
which  for  centuries  had  recognized  the  Hapsburgs 
as  their  legitimate  sovereigns,  many  lands  of  much 
more  recent  acquisition  populated  by  diverse 
races,  and  by  obliging  them  all  to  obey  the  abso- 
lutist, aristocratic,  and  bureaucratic  government 
at  Vienna.  But  when,  after  1859  and  1866,  the 
empire  began  to  totter  and  seemed  less  invincible 
and  inexorable  than  heretofore,  when,  by  recogniz- 
ing the  national  existence  of  Hungary,  it  showed 
itself  no  longer  able  to  crush  all  internal  opposi- 
tion as  in  1848,  the  populations  held  in  subjection 
to  the  Hapsburgs,  not  by  respect  for  legitimate 
authority  but  by  force,  took  courage. 

A  period  of  crisis  set  in  for  the  empire  which 
force  had   founded,   but  which   force   was  now 


i82  Problems  of  Peace 

abandoning.  This  crisis  explains  why  in  1882, 
two  years  before  the  secret  treaty  between  Ger- 
many and  Russia,  Germany  and  Austria  had 
admitted  Italy  as  a  third  party  to  their  alliance. 
In  order  to  understand  this  remarkable  event  we 
must  keep  in  mind  that  Italy  possessed  a  territory 
only  half  that  of  Austria,  inhabited  by  a  population 
which  was  then  at  least  a  third  less  numerous, 
that  the  Austrians  were  at  her  gates,  for  the  fron- 
tier even  after  1866  had  been  so  adjusted  as  to  give 
Austria  all  the  advantages  if  she  chose  to  attack, 
and  finally  that  the  Itahan  army  was  not  only 
less  in  numbers  but  still  raw  and  inexperienced, 
whereas  Austria  had  been  a  military  empire  for 
centuries.  There  was,  in  fact,  such  a  grave  in- 
equaUty  of  forces  as  to  make  the  isolation  in 
which  Italy  found  herself  after  1870  very  danger- 
ous, and  it  is  not  strange  that,  as  France  could  no 
longer  help  her,  she  should  seek  a  new  ally.  That 
ally  was  naturally  Germany,  both  because  there 
was  no  other,  because  the  secret  aims  of  German 
policy  were  unknown,  and  because  it  seemed  that 
Germany  also  had  reason  to  fear  the  revengeful 
spirit  of  the  Hapsburgs. 

Thus  it  was  that  in  1877  Francesco  Crispi,  one 
of  the  leaders  of  the  Left  who  had  come  into  office 
in  the  previous  year,  visited  Bismarck  at  Gastein 


The  German  Peace  183 

and  in  the  name  of  his  Government  proposed  an 
alliance  between  Italy  and  Germany  in  order  that 
the  two  States  might  unite  to  defend  themselves 
if  France  or  Austria  attacked  either,  and  prevent 
new  encroachments  by  Austria    in  the  Balkans. 
He  received  the  reply  that,  though  Germany  was 
ready  to  help  Italy  against  France,  she  would  on  no 
account  whatever  do  anything  to  annoy  Austria, 
that  Germany  had  no  interests  in  the  East  where 
the  Russians  and  the  Turks  were  fighting,   and 
that,  provided  the  conflagration  did  not  spread  to 
Europe,  she  did  not  mind  if  Austria  got  what  she 
wanted  in  the  East.     As  Bismarck  was  then  pre- 
paring his  alliance  with  Austria  the  conversations 
at  Gastein  led  to  nothing.     How  was  it  then  that 
Italy,  which  had  come  forward  in  1877  with  an 
offer  to  ally  herself  with  Germany  against  Austria 
and  had  retired  on  finding  that  Germany  was  too 
close  a  friend  of  Austria,  allied  herself  in  1882  not 
only  with  Germany  but  with  Austria  as  well  ?       ^ 
The  usual  answer  to  this  question  is  "Tunis!" 
"V^Hien    France    established    her    protectorate    of 
Tunis  on  which  Italy  also  had  designs,  Italy  hesi- 
tated no  longer  and  went  over  to  the  enemy.    Yet 
the  offence  created  by  Tunis  was  rather  a  final 
occasion  of  the  alliance  than  its  chief  or  even  one 
of  its  principal  causes.     For  in  this  very  treaty  of 


1 84  Problems  of  Peace 

1882  Germany  in  no  way  pledged  herself  to  pre- 
vent French  expansion  in  the  Mediterranean,  but, 
it  would  appear,  only  to  help  Italy  if  attacked  by 
France.  Italy  on  the  other  hand  engaged  herself 
for  five  years  to  help  Germany  if  attacked  by  France 
and  Russia,  and  to  remain  neutral  if  Germany  took 
the  offensive  against  France  in  another  "prevent- 
ive war."  Further,  though  Italian  Statesmen 
have  always  distrusted  France's  Mediterranean 
ambitions  which  Germany  was  then  encouraging, 
they  have  never  seriously  feared  her  aggression. 
Crispi  himself,  though  not  a  friend  of  France,  in 
his  conversation  with  Bismarck  at  Gastein,  dis- 
posed in  a  very  few  words  of  the  danger  of  a  war 
with  France  which  in  his  opinion  could  only  be 
brought  about  by  a  victory  of  the  Conservatives  at 
the  coming  elections  (when  as  every  one  knows,* 
they  were  beaten),  and  discussed  the  Austrian 
danger  at  great  length.  Why  then  did  Italy 
make  the  alliance  in  1882?  What  was  in  fact  the 
compensation  guaranteed  to  Italy? 

It  was  the  friendship  and  peace  which  Austria 
promised  her.  Italy  was  compelled  to  become  the 
ally  of  Austria  and  Germany  in  order  to  defend 
herself  not  against  France  but  against  Austria. 
The  Triple  Alliance  was  therefore  in  principle  a 
tribute  to  the  triumph  of  Germanism  which  Italy 


The  German  Peace  185 

could  not  evade  once  the  German  Empires,  rivals 
in  1866,  had  come  to  terms.     If,  before  she  entered 
this  alliance,  Italy  could  rely  but  little  on  France 
in  a  war  with  Austria,  all  hope  of  such  assistance 
was   lost   when    Germany   was   in   alliance   with 
Austria.     To  aid  Italy,  France  would  have  had  to 
run  the  risk  of  a  war  with  Germany.     Therefore, 
as  she  could  no  longer  count  on  a  French  alliance, 
and  as  she,  for  excellent  reasons,  did  not  wish  to 
find  herself  at  grips  with  Austria,  what  remained 
but  to  bow  to  necessity  when  Bismarck,   when 
again  approached,  replied  that  in  order  to  reach 
Berlin,  it  was  necessar}'-  to  go  round  b^^  Vienna. 
When  a  State,  in  order  not  to  be  overwhelmed 
by  a  more  powerful  enemy,  takes  the  desperate 
course  of  forming  an  alliance  with  him,  it  is  neces- 
sarily compelled  to  abandon  all  the  advantages  of 
the  bargain.     This  Italy  found  to  be  only  too  true. 
Germany   obtained   assurance  that   Italy   would 
either  remain  neutral  or  assist  her  in  a  new  war 
with  France.    Austria  secured  a  pledge  that  Italy 
would  repress  "Irredentism,"  that  she  would  not 
assist  any  of  her  enemies,  and  would  therefore  leave 
her  a  free  hand  in  the  East.     Italy  got  nothing  but 
a  promise  that  Austria  would  not  harm  her.     The 
first  Treaty  of  the  Triple  Alliance  proved  in  fact 
that,  as  the  balance  of  power  in  Europe  had  been 


1 86  Problems  of  Peace 

disturbed,  first  by  the  war  of  1870  and  then  by  the 
Austro-German  alliance,  Italy  in  spite  of  the  wars 
of  1859  and  1866  had  not  yet  gained  complete 
independence,  for  she  was  not  in  a  position  to  dis- 
cuss as  an  equal  proposals  of  alliance  with  Austria 
and  Germany  who  were  already  allied,  but  was 
compelled  to  submit  to  their  will  to  an  extent  which 
was  inconsistent  with  Italy's  national  autonomy. 
This  first  treaty  was  so  sterile,  not  to  say  so 
burdensome,  for  Italy  that  in  1887,  when  it  was 
about  to  expire,  some  improvement  was  brought 
about.  Count  Robilant,  a  skilful  minister,  by  a 
threat  that  he  would  not  renew  the  bargain,  se- 
cured the  addition  of  two  new  treaties  to  the  old 
agreement  of  1882.  One  of  these,  with  Germany, 
provided  that  Germany  would  give  armed  aid  to 
Italy  if  France,  in  Africa  or  elsewhere,  attempted 
to  alter  the  balance  of  power  in  the  Mediterranean 
to  Italy's  disadvantage ;  the  other  was  an  agreement 
with  Austria-Hungary  pledging  the  latter  to  re- 
spect the  status  quo  in  the  East  as  far  as  possi- 
ble. If  the  necessity  arose  to  occupy  temporarily 
or  permanently  territories  in  the  Balkans  or  on  the 
Turkish  coasts,  or  in  islands  in  the  Adriatic  or  the 
JEgean,  the  occupying  power  was  to  proceed  with 
the  consent  of  the  other  party  and  give  adequate 
compensation.     At  the  same  time,  in  February 


The  German  Peace  187 

-^and  March,  1887,  Italy,  England,  and  Austria  (so 
far  as  is  known  by  a  mere  exchange  of  notes) 
concluded  a  naval  alliance  the  object  of  which  was 
to  maintain  the  status  quo  in  the  Mediterranean. 
England  undertook  to  assist  Italy  and  Austria 
with  her  fleet  against  any  Power  which  attempted 
to  alter  the  existing  position  in  the  Mediterranean 
or  the  adjacent  seas. 

As  thus  renewed  the  alliance  was  no  longer  for 
Italy  an  empty  nutshell  as  it  had  been  in  1882. 
There  was  a  kernel  though  it  was  a  very  small  one. 
The  minister  who  gained  this  advantage  gained  it 
partly  because  he  knew  how  to  manoeuvre,  but 
also  because  his  desires  coincided,  if  not  with 
Austrian  aims,  at  any  rate  with  the  profound 
designs  of  German  policy.  In  1887,  when  the 
Triple  Alliance  was  renewed  with  these  additions 
and  the  naval  agreement  between  Italy,  Austria, 
and  England  was  concluded,  the  aged  Bismarck 
could  contemplate  with  satisfaction  the  work  which 
he  had  now  completed.  After  making  three  wars 
he  had  succeeded,  like  the  Holy  Alliance,  in 
imposing  on  Europe  a  peace  which  had  lasted 
seventeen  years  and  was  destined  to  last  for 
another  twenty-seven.  Unlike  the  Holy  Alliance 
he  had  not  united  governments  in  an  understand- 
ing, which  was  now  impossible  owing  to  the  fact 


1 88  Problems  of  Peace 

that  in  the  European  Babel  the  governments 
spoke  all  manner  of  different  languages ;  but  he  had 
so  bound  them  in  their  rivalry  for  distant  con- 
quests, that,  while  always  at  variance,  they  never 
dared  to  come  to  blows.  This  he  contrived  by 
means  of  a  diabolical  network  of  treaties  the 
threads  of  which  he  was  able  to  keep  in  his  own 
hand,  because  Germany  alone  was  disinterested  in 
the  midst  of  all  these  colonial  ambitions.  By  the 
Austro-Hungarian  alliance  and  the  naval  entente 
between  England,  Austria,  and  Italy,  he  compelled 
Russia  to  keep  the  peace  by  threatening  her  with 
the  German  army,  and  with  the  British  Fleet  if  she 
tried  to  aggrandize  herself  in  the  Balkans  or  in  the 
East.  But  he  reassured  Russia,  after  frightening 
her,  by  the  secret  treaty  against  Austria,  on  condi- 
tion that  she  did  not  attack  Austria  or  seek  to  dis- 
turb the  existing  equilibrium  in  the  Mediterranean 
and  its  adjacent  seas. 

By  the  new  treaties  of  1887  between  Italy, 
Austria,  and  Germany,  he  was  able  to  restrain  the 
ambitions  of  Austria  in  the  Balkans  and  in  the 
East,  and  to  compel  Italy,  whether  she  would  or  no, 
to  live  at  peace  with  Austria,  to  persecute  Irredent- 
ism  and  to  attempt  nothing  new  in  the  Mediter- 
ranean. Italy  was  promised  assistance  only  in 
the  event  of  attempts  by  others  to  disturb  the  bal- 


The  German  Peace  189 

ance  there !  Finally,  b}^  means  of  all  these  treaties 
and  the  naval  entente  between  England,  Italy,  and 
Austria,  Bismarck  put  in  operation  what  had  been 
one  of  the  cardinal  principles  of  his  policy  since 
1870,  the  segregation  of  France  from  all  the  great 
combinations  of  European  policy  and  from  the 
concert  of  the  Great  Powers,  encouraging  her  by 
way  of  compensation  to  send  expeditions  to  Asia 
and  Africa.  Moreover,  even  had  she  not  been 
distracted  by  internal  crises,  what  could  France 
have  done  alone  ?  Her  position  once  more  recalled 
the  isolation  in  which  she  had  found  herself  in  the 
midst  of  a  distrustful  and  hostile  Europe  in  181 5. 

Such  was  the  peace  which  triumphant  Ger- 
manism bestowed  on  Europe  after  1870;  an  in- 
extricable imbroglio  of  distrust,  rancour,  fear, 
friendships,  and  enmities,  real  or  pretended.  This 
situation  was  dominated  by  Bismarck,  not  only 
because  he  could  e'vevy  now  and  then  sound  a 
threatening  note  of  military  terrorism,  but  because 
he  had  resisted  the  ambition  of  distant  expansion 
to  which  other  States  had  yielded,  and  had  thus 
been  able  to  weave  an  invisible  and  magic  net  in 
which  for  twenty  years  he  held  the  Great  Powers  of 
Europe  fast  bound  and  impotent  to  break  it. 

There  came  one  at  last  who  did  break  it.  The 
generation  bom  between  i860  and  1870  remembers 


I90  Problems  of  Peace 

that  William  I.  died  in  1888,  having  lived  to  be 
over  ninety,  and  that,  after  an  interregnum  rather 
than  a  reign  of  three  months,  he  was  succeeded  by 
his  grandson  William  II.  a  young  man  of  twent}-- 
eight.  It  also  remembers  that,  little  more  than  a 
year  after  his  accession,  William  II.  dismissed  the 
veteran  Bismarck.  It  is  less  known  that,  when 
Bismarck  had  retired  into  private  life,  William  II. 
annulled  the  secret  treaty  concluded  with  Russia 
in  1884,  abandoned  the  policy,  the  object  of  which 
was  to  keep  Russia  in  check  by  the  fear  of  Austria, 
and  Austria  by  the  fear  of  Russia;  left  Russia  to 
provide  for  her  future  as  she  thought  fit,  did  all  he 
could  to  strengthen  the  alliance  with  Austria  and 
Italy  and,  as  opposed  to  Bismarck  who  regarded 
Oriental  affairs  as  extraneous  to  German  policy, 
decided  that  Germany  should  go  forward  in  the 
East.  How  are  we  to  explain  so  sudden  a  change 
from  the  old  to  the  new  generation  ? 

When  William  II.  ascended  the  throne  the 
world  in  general  frowned  on  him.  It  was  every- 
where rumoured  that  the  young  monarch  had  an 
ambition  to  add  to  the  trophies  won  by  his  grand- 
father, and  that  he  would  reopen  the  Temple  of 
Janus.  Then  the  world  repented  of  its  suspicions, 
believed  what  he  said  and  saluted  him  as  the 
Emperor  of  Peace.     Today    the   world   suspects 


The  German  Peace  191 

that  it  has  been  duped  by  a  quarter  of  a  century 
of  consummate  acting.  For  us,  whose  eyes  can- 
not pierce  the  deeper  recesses  of  his  conscious  or 
unconscious  motives,  it  will  be  enough  to  make 
clear  how  he  gradually  was  led  to  challenge  the 
world  to  battle  by  the  natural  consequences  and 
the  inevitable  development  of  the  policy  of  Bis- 
marck, although  he  had  himself  disavowed  that 
policy.  There  is  no  doubt  that  Bismarck  and 
William  I.,  having  in  seven  years  successfully 
carried  out  three  grand  acts  of  spoliation  of  terri- 
tory and  treasure,  were  sincerely  desirous  of 
stopping  short  and  living  at  peace  with  the  victims 
and  the  spectators  of  their  crimes.  It  is,  however, 
much  easier  to  start  human  affairs  on  a  treacher- 
ous incline  such  as  this  than  to  check  them  half- 
way down  the  slope.  There  were  only  too  many 
reasons  why  Germany  and  Europe,  once  launched 
on  this  precipitous  career,  could  not  obey  when 
Bismarck  cried,  ' '  Stop ! " 

For  one  thing  the  art  of  war  had  been  falsified 
in  all  civilized  Occidental  States  by  the  war  of 
1870.  The  German  victories  had  as  usual  been 
attributed,  not  merely  to  the  tactical  and  strategi- 
cal plans  of  the  more  powerful  combatant,  but  to 
a  kind  of  prodigy  the  secret  of  which  was  sought 
in  strategy,  in  tactics,  in  theory,  in  organization, 


192  Problems  of  Peace 

and  so  on.  But  the  German  army  was  an  auda- 
cious improvisation,  full  of  defects  as  well  as  of 
qualities,  and  of  these  defects  and  qualities  the 
military  art  in  its  technical  considerations  of  the 
German  victory  had  been  well  aware.  It  was  there- 
fore led  to  regard  as  true  principles  what  the  expe- 
rience of  centuries  had  judged  to  be  false.  Such 
doctrines  were  that  the  strength  of  armies  varies 
directly  as  their  numbers,  and  is  consequently 
increased  as  the  period  of  service  is  diminished; 
that  the  nation  in  arms  is  the  most  potent  and 
perfect  of  all  armies ;  that  the  political  principle  of 
military  service  is  better  than  the  professional, 
even  in  cases  where  an  expert  rather  than  a  nu- 
merous army  is  required ;  that  the  perfection  of  the 
weapons  invented  and  made  by  modem  industry 
is  in  itself  a  power  to  a  certain  extent  independent 
of  the  value  of  the  soldier.  The  result  was  that 
after  1870  all  the  States  of  Europe  sooner  or  later 
imitated  the  military  institutions  of  Germany. 
They  declared  for  a  universal  obligation  on  all 
their  subjects  to  serve  in  the  army  for  three 
years  and — taking  Germany  as  their  model  and 
master — every  State  began  to  increase  the  number 
of  its  effectives  and  to  spend  all  its  time  inventing 
new  and  more  powerful  instruments  of  destruction. 
Such  was  the  universal  suspicion  and  fear  that 


The  German  Peace  193 

whenever  one  Power  brought  in  some  increase  or 
improvement,  all  the  other  Powers  felt  obHged  to 
imitate  it,  and  this  led  originators  and  imitators 
alike  to  still  further  increases  and  improve- 
ments. 

Thus,  in  the  vicious  circle  of  the  German  peace, 
began  the  unlimited  rivalry  in  armaments  which 
was  a  new  phenomenon  in  history  after  1870.  It 
was  unlimited  because  it  recognized  no  limit  but 
the  amount  of  money  and  the  number  of  fit  men 
available.  Was  it,  however,  reasonable  to  suppose 
that  a  people  which,  now  that  it  had  won  three 
wars,  regarded  itself  as  invincible  would  continue 
to  increase  its  army  merely  in  order  to  maintain  its 
power  as  Bismarck  wished,  and  not  to  increase  it  ? 
To  credit  Germany  with  so  much  moderation  and 
prudence  was  all  the  more  rash  because  even  the 
satisfaction  of  victory  had  not  calmed  but  rather 
had  exacerbated  the  mania  which  had  excited 
the  German  people  since  18 15.  Persuaded  of  its 
invincibility  in  war  and  master  of  practically  all 
the  sciences,  the  German  people  was  not  content 
to  maintain  its  military  and  scientific  primacy. 
They  wished  to  be  as  rich  as  France,  England,  or 
the  United  States,  to  rival  these  powers  in  all  the 
branches  of  trade  in  which  they  were  the  leaders, 
to  rob  them  of  the  admiration  and  authority  and 


194  Problems  of  Peace 

of  the  power  which  they  enjoyed  in  every  country 
in  the  world. 

The  enterprise  was  difficult  because  the  rivals 
were  strong,  but  the  Germans  were  numerous  and 
were  increasing  every  year.  They  have  a  soil 
rich  in  iron  and  coal.  They  are  tenacious,  insinu- 
ating, patient,  and  laborious  people,  possessed 
of  the  capacity  for  observation,  imitation,  and 
solidarity.  They  know  how  to  study  and  to  filch 
the  secrets  of  others,  how  to  apply,  develop,  and 
perfect  the  discoveries  they  have  stolen  and  how 
to  co-operate  with  each  other.  What  is  more  im- 
portant, they  are  exalted  by  a  strange  species  of 
Messianic  nationalism  such  as  has  not  previously 
been  seen  in  the  world.  They  regard  themselves 
as  eternally  at  war  with  other  peoples  for  the 
greatness  of  Germany.  They  do  everjrthing  as  if 
they  were  on  the  field  of  Sadowa  or  Sedan.  They 
write,  teach,  trade,  cross  the  ocean  in  search  of 
work,  smelt  iron,  and  blow  glass  all  in  the  same 
spirit. 

The  doctrines  of  English  Liberalism  of  the 
Manchester  School,  so  much  prized  in  France  and 
Italy  in  the  first  half  of  the  nineteenth  century  in 
opposition  to  the  despotism  and  paternalism  of 
the  old  governments,  had  been  coldly  received  in 
Germany.     German    men   of   science   had   taken 


The  German  Peace  195 

pleasure  in  defining  the  political  economy  of  Adam 
Smith  as  "cosmopolitan  economics"  which  might 
work  in  an  ideal,  colourless,  and  non-material  world 
with  an  imaginary  race  all  the  same  in  language, 
passions,  customs,  and  interests,  where  there  were 
no  rival  races,  nations,  or  States.  To  this  abstract 
doctrine  they  opposed  the  so-called  "national 
economics"  which  regarded  agriculture,  industry-, 
and  commerce  as  vital  organs  of  each  separate 
nation  and  which,  far  from  rebelling  against  the 
State  like  the  orthodox  Political  economy,  gladly 
subordinated  itself  to  State  control. 

Even  before  1866,  while  Germany  was  weak, 
these  doctrines  had  exercised  a  certain  influence 
there,  inducing  the  larger  States,  for  example,  to 
reserve  to  themselves  the  construction  and  work- 
ing of  railways  instead  of  leaving  this  to  private 
capital  as  had  been  the  case  in  England  and  in 
France.  But  both  in  Germany  and  elsewhere 
these  views  had  been  obscured  by  the  vogue  of 
English  Liberalism  and  the  influence  of  the  classic 
economic  theory.  After  1870  the  new  economics 
shared  the  fortunes  of  the  Empire  and,  tinged  with 
the  new  Messianic  nationalism,  they  no  longer 
spoke  under  their  breath  and  in  modest  tones  to 
Germany  alone.  They  lectured  to  all  Europe; 
were    called    into    council    by    the    government. 


196  Problems  of  Peace 

To  the  non-intervention  of  the  Manchester  school, 
they  opposed  a  programme  of  social  legislation 
which  professed  to  mitigate  or  altogether  abolish 
the  most  cruel  of  the  rites  of  the  religion  of  fire 
and  steel  which  all  nations  now  so  ardently  pro- 
fessed. To  British  Free  Trade,  which  had  pre- 
sented itself  to  the  world  as  opening  its  arms  to 
all  peoples,  they  opposed  protection  as  a  vivifying 
and  warlike  doctrine.  In  1879  the  Empire  en- 
closed itself  within  a  Chinese  Wall  of  TariflFs  and 
Customs  Duties. 

And  now  the  world  saw  this  people  once  more 
overturn  the  experience  of  ages  and  the  natural 
order  of  cause  and  effect.  It  saw  them,  after 
winning  its  wars  by  shortening  its  term  of  service 
and  fearlessly  applying  the  principle  of  the  nation 
in  arms,  successfully  create  within  the  fortress 
of  a  protective  tariff  a  lively  expansive  industry 
continually  developing,  always  prepared  to  meet 
its  competitors,  always  fertile  in  new  subtleties, 
new  cunning,  new  inventions,  and  new  initiative. 
In  Germany  the  protected  industries  did  not  grow 
prematurely  old  as  they  did  elsewhere.  They 
used  the  tremendous  benefits  of  protection  to 
increase  themselves,  to  perfect  their  machinery,  to 
add  to  the  number  of  their  workmen,  to  produce 
more,  to  try  their  fortune  in  more  distant,  more 


The  German  Peace  197 

difficult,  and  less  known  markets  at  the  cost  of 
great  sacrifices,  and  even  laid  out  in  this  foreign 
trade  part  of  the  profit  they  made  at  home,  often 
accepting  a  less  reward  for  their  trouble  and 
greatly  increased  responsibility  than  they  might 
otherwise  have  done,  so  thoroughly  were  they 
impregnated  by  the  spirit  of  nationalism  and  the 
determination  to  vanquish  other  nations  in  indus- 
try and  commerce  as  they  had  done  in  arms. 

In  fact,  although  since  1870,  Germans  have 
continued  to  emigrate  to  all  latitudes  as  they  had 
done  before,  to  present  themselves  wherever  there 
was  need  for  a  laborious  workman  or  a  zealous 
and  servile  employee  to  write  countless  volumes, 
to  teach  everything  knowable,  to  trade  and  invent, 
and  to  adore  fire  and  steel  as  the  new  gods  of 
riches  and  power,  they  are  yet  no  longer  the  same 
peoples.  Their  triumph  after  the  long  period  of 
hope  deferred  has  changed  them.  In  their  own 
country  and  abroad,  traders  or  teachers,  captains 
of  industry  or  scholars,  administrators  or  bankers, 
statesmen  or  ecclesiastics,  the  Germans'  one  desire 
is  to  prove  to  others  or  to  themselves  that  Germany 
is  the  equal  or  more  than  the  equal  of  all  other 
nations.  The  child  of  war,  Germany  seems  unable 
to  exist  except  by  fighting,  by  continuing  in  indus- 
try, art,  and  science  the  combat  interrupted  on  the 


198  Problems  of  Peace 

battle-field.  How  could  such  a  people  recognize 
itself  in  the  cautious  prudence  of  the  old  emperor 
and  his  ministers  ? 

William  II.  accordingly  sent  the  old  Chancellor 
into  retirement  in  order  to  be  able  to  adapt  to  the 
needs  of  the  time  and  to  carry  on  the  policy  which 
had  now  disillusioned  and  terrified  its  author. 
He  ceased  to  balance  between  Russia  and  Austria, 
but  resolutely  took  Austria's  part,  and  decided 
to  use  the  alliance  no  longer  to  maintain  equi- 
librium but  to  dominate  Europe,  not  openly,  as 
Napoleon  I.  had  done,  or  secretly  hke  Nicholas  I., 
but  in  such  a  way  that  the  world  could  know  it, 
yet  not  so  manifestly  that  they  would  be  afraid. 
He  planned  to  make  Germany  the  controlling 
power  in  the  East  by  entering  into  a  sort  of  alli- 
ance with  the  Mussulman  world.  He  recognized 
the  new  German  industry"  alongside  of  the  Army, 
Agriculture,  and  the  schools,  as  a  legitimate  daugh- 
ter of  the  Empire.  He  protected  it  and  helped  it 
to  spread  itself  all  over  the  world,  mitigating  by 
commercial  treaties  the  too  drastic  operation  of 
the  protective  system,  and  putting  at  its  service 
all  the  powers  of  the  State.  He  designed  a  great 
Navy  at  the  same  time  that  he  was  continuously 
increasing  the  Army.  Finally  he  did  not  forget 
to  declare  himself  the  protector  of  Peace,  while 


The  German  Peace  199 

every  now  and  then  rattling  the  sabre,  or  to  lavish 
fair  words,  cordial  assurances,  and  protestations  of 
friendship  on  all  the  Powers  including  England, 
Russia,  and  even  France ! 

The  political  methods  of  William  II.  were  con- 
sidered to  be  noisy,  impulsive,  contradictory,  ill- 
balanced,  and  savouring  of  charlatanry.  These 
defects  were  too  conspicuous  to  escape  notice  in 
the  world  and  even  in  Germany.  But  the  close 
observer  will  not  fail  to  perceive  under  the  want 
of  skill  the  continuation  and  amplification  of 
the  Bismarckian  policy  which  was  desired  by  the 
German  People  and  the  determination  to  use  the 
power  of  the  Empire  no  longer  to  preserve  what 
it  had  gained,  but  to  increase  its  possessions. 
There  is  no  doubt  that  the  Hmits  which  Bismarck 
wished  to  set  to  Germany  were  prudent,  but  he 
alone  saw  this  in  the  midst  of  the  tumult  of  ambi- 
tion and  cupidity,  to  which  he  and  the  course  of 
events  had  given  rise,  and  the  impulse  which  he, 
and  what  he  brought  about,  gave  to  these  passions, 
was  too  strong  to  be  contained  by  the  boundaries 
which  he  designed.  His  work  was  destined  to 
continue  after  him  and  to  drive  Germany  beyond 
the  invisible  limit  of  wisdom  to  her  destruction. 

The  greatest  of  the  military  Powers  of  Europe 
was  now  ambitious  to  play  her  part  as  a  world 


200  Problems  of  Peace 

Power.  She  wished  to  contend  with  England  for 
the  mastery  of  the  seas  and  for  industrial  su- 
premacy, to  conquer  for  herself  a  vast  Colonial 
Empire,  to  make  her  diplomacy,  her  capital,  her 
literature,  her  political  authority,  and  her  example 
felt  in  every  quarter  of  the  globe;  to  create  for 
herself  a  clientele  of  as  many  peoples  civilized 
and  barbarous,  new  and  old,  of  as  many  proteges 
and  disciples  as  she  could.  William  II.  proposed 
to  satisfy  the  new  ambitions  of  his  people  by  what 
he  himself  described  as  Weltpolitik. 

These  ambitions  were  the  descendants  of  the 
older  and  more  modest  ambition  which  Bismarck 
had  satisfied.  But  the  Weltpolitik  of  the  new 
Emperor,  though  descended  from  the  policy  of 
Bismarck,  broke  the  invisible  net  in  which  Bis- 
marck had  caught  all  the  Powers.  Abandoned  to 
her  own  devices  and  fearing  that  she  might  be 
attacked  by  Germany  and  Austria,  Russia  once 
more  drew  near  to  France  and  soon  concluded  an 
alliance  with  her.  By  this  alliance  France  finally 
emerged  from  the  Lazzaretto  in  which  Bismarck 
had  segregated  her  for  twenty  years  and  with  head 
erect  re-entered  the  circle  of  the  Great  Powers. 
The  old  confusion  of  Powers,  all  friendly  or  inimical 
to  each  other,  was  split  into  two  coalitions,  a 
change  which  infuriated  the  old  Chancellor  in  his 


The  German  Peace  201 

retirement  at  Friedrichsruhe  as  an  outrage  com- 
mitted by  an  unskilful  hand  upon  his  masterpiece. 
It  is  at  all  events  clear  now,  after  four  years  of 
world  war,  that  a  close  alliance  of  the  German  and 
Austrian  Empires  was  a  much  more  powerful 
combination  than  the  alHance  of  Russia  and 
France. 

The  power  of  Germany  is  usually  attributed  to 
the  constitution  of  the  Empire,  but  we  must  not 
forget  to  add  the  Austro-Hungarian  alliance 
which  again  unified,  if  only  in  a  diplomatic  sense, 
the  Germanic  world  divided  by  the  war  of  1866, 
and  which,  drawn  ever  closer,  more  especially 
after  the  accession  of  William  II.,  doubled  Ger- 
many's power  without  the  necessity  of  going  to 
war.  Did  it  not  enable  Germanism,  through  the 
German  dynasty  of  the  Hapsburgs,  to  gain  posses- 
sion of  Hungary  and  of  the  millions  of  soldiers  which 
the  Slavonic  and  Italian  populations  subject  to 
the  Dual  Monarchy  would  be  forced  to  furnish, 
to  press  upon  Italy  from  the  Trentino  and  Friuli, 
to  threaten  Russia  and  establish  direct  contact 
^dth  the  Balkans?  Suppose  that  the  Austro- 
Hungarian  Empire  were  broken  up,  the  German 
populations  incorporated  in  Germany  and  the 
Slavs  and  the  Magyars  constituted  independent 
States.     Germany  vv'ould  then  be  more  vast  but 


202  Problems  of  Peace 

less  powerful  than  she  was  on  the  eve  of  the  war, 
because  she  would  be  able  to  count  only  on  the 
German  forces,  and  w^ould  no  longer  be  able  to 
intimidate  and  overawe  Italy  and  the  Balkan 
States. 

The  alliance  between  Austria,  Hungary,  and  the 
German  Empire  was  more  than  an  agreement 
concluded  between  two  powerful  States  to  assist 
each  other  in  certain  difficulties,  because  thereby 
the  Germanic  world  effected  not  merely  its 
own  unity  but  a  superunity.  Nor  should  the 
advantage  be  forgotten  which  Germany  could 
derive  from  the  alliance  between  France  and 
Russia  as  well  as  from  the  English  occupation  of 
Egypt  in  1882  for  her  new  designs  in  the  Ea^t. 
France  and  England  were  the  two  Powers  which 
Turkey  had  for  centuries  regarded  as  her  friends, 
which  had  on  several  occasions  helped  her  against 
Russia,  her  immemorial  enemy.  But  when  Eng- 
land planted  herself  in  Egypt,  thus  separating  the 
Asiatic  from  the  African  provinces  of  the  Ottoman 
Empire,  when  France  allied  herself  with  Russia, 
Turkey  was  forced  to  seek  another  friend  and 
protector.  Germany,  on  the  contrary,  had  never 
occupied  or  conquered  a  yard  of  Turkish  territory, 
and  in  support  of  her  new  interests  in  the  East 
could  allege  her  previous  disinterestedness.     The 


The  German  Peace  203 

reason  why  the  influence  of  Germany  at  Con- 
stantinople grew  so  rapidly  during  the  twenty- 
five  years  preceding  the  world  war  in  spite  of  all  the 
efforts  of  its  rivals  and  in  spite  of  all  that  happened, 
is  to  be  found  not  in  the  victories  of  1870  but  in 
Egyptian  affairs  and  in  the  alUance  made  between 
France  and  Russia. 

According  to  the  canon  of  Bismarckian  policy 
the  new  policy  was  defective,  but  for  a  different 
reason.  It  lacked  definite  aims.  Germany  wished 
to  be  a  World  Power.  Very  good.  But  the 
world  is  wide,  and,  in  the  immensity  of  the  world, 
this  ambition  looked  everyw^here  without  knowing 
where  to  stop.  Where  was  the  longed  for  Colonial 
Empire  to  be  founded  and  at  whose  expense?  In 
Africa,  in  Asia,  or  in  South  America?  At  the 
expense  of  England,  or  of  France,  or  by  a  partition 
of  the  world  in  agreement  with  both  those  powers, 
or  with  one  of  the  two  against  the  other?  Between 
1890  and  1900  the  new  German  policy  was  unable 
to  select  its  path  and  constantly  hesitated  between 
contradictory  proposals. 

Germany's  designs  at  sea  and  her  ambitions  of 
industrial  supremacy  brought  her  into  conflict 
with  England  and  drove  her  to  make  common 
cause  with  England's  enemies  who  were  then 
France   and    Russia.     France,    however,    though 


204  Problems  of  Peace 

not  at  the  moment  friendly  with  England,  hated 
Germany  more  than  ever  and  Russia  was  on  the 
point  of  allying  herself  with  France.  At  the 
beginning  of  the  new  reign,  therefore,  Germany 
was  making  advances  to  England  and  continued  to 
do  so  until  she  succeeded  in  obtaining  the  cession 
of  the  island  of  Heligoland.  In  1895,  however,  a 
new  power,  Japan,  suddenly  appeared  in  the  Far 
East,  and  having  beaten  China,  imposed  on  her 
the  Treaty  of  Shimonoseki,  whereby  she  obtained 
the  cession  of  Port  Arthur.  Germany  seized  the 
opportunity  to  draw  nearer  to  the  group  of  Euro- 
pean Powers  which  was  hostile  to  England.  As 
Russia  had  designs  on  Port  Arthur  Germany  took 
the  step  which  Russia  had  desired  but  had  not 
dared  to  take.  She  intervened  between  the 
belligerents,  tore  up  the  Treaty  of  Shimonoseki  and 
imposed  a  treaty  more  favourable  to  China  which 
deprived  Japan  of  Port  Arthur.  Russia  hastened 
to  unite  with  Germany  in  her  action  and  drew 
her  ally  France  after  her.  For  a  moment  the 
whole  of  Continental  Europe  seemed  to  coalesce 
round  Germany  and,  since  the  three  Great  Powers 
of  the  new  alliance,  Germany,  France,  and  Russia, 
were  in  conflict  with  England,  England  would 
have  been  seriously  threatened  if  the  coalition  had 
lasted.     But  it  did  not  last.     When,  at  the  begin- 


The  German  Peace  205 

ning  of  1896,  Germany  assumed  the  role  of 
protector  of  the  Transvaal  in  the  struggle  with 
England,  France  and  Russia  drew  back.  On  the 
other  hand  the  treaty  of  the  Triple  Alliance 
expired  in  1896.  It  would  have  been  difficult 
to  persuade  Italy  to  renew  it  if  Germany  had 
quarrelled  with  England. 

The  new  policy  of  Germany  oscillated,  there- 
fore, between  1890  and  1900  in  search  of  some 
definite  aim.  Hence  the  uncertainties,  the  re- 
bounds and  the  divagations  which  enraged  the 
German  people  and  the  improvisations  which  every 
now  and  then  astonished  Europe.  Such  was  the 
policy  of  etwas  erwerben,  of  "getting  something, " 
in  China — which  ended  in  the  German  occupation 
of  Kiau  Chau,  the  Russian  occupation  of  Port 
Arthur,  and  so  on,  until,  in  1898,  it  seemed  as  if 
the  Celestial  Empire  were  about  to  be  partitioned 
among  the  greater  States  of  Europe.  In  the  Near 
East  alone,  Germany  went  forward  surely  and 
resolutely,  insinuating  herself  skilfully  into  the 
councils  of  the  Ottoman  Government,  Germaniz- 
ing the  Turkish  army  through  her  instructors, 
obtaining  new  concessions  and  extending  those 
which  she  had  already  obtained,  among  which  was 
the  famous  Bagdad  Railway,  contending  success- 
fully with  England  and  France  for  the  Western 


2o6  Problems  of  Peace 

hegemony  in  Asia,  and  solemnly  proclaiming, 
through  the  mouth  of  Kaiser  Wilhelm  in  his  famous 
speech  at  Damascus  on  November  8,  1898,  to  the 
three  hundred  millions  of  Mussulmans  who  vener- 
ated the  Sultan  as  the  Caliph,  that  "the  German 
Emperor  was  their  friend  for  ever" — words  in 
which  the  Mahometan  believed  because  Germany 
had  never  touched  the  territories  ruled  by  the 
Crescent. 

While,  however,  the  new  German  policy  sought 
its  path  throughout  the  world  Europe  seemed  to 
have  finally  got  rid  of  its  turbulent  past.  The 
doctrines  of  authority  in  all  the  States  approxi- 
mated more  and  more  closely  to  the  principles 
of  the  Revolution  and  were  growing  weaker.  How 
much  subdued  in  parliaments,  at  elections,  in  the 
press  and  in  the  schools  were  the  furious  conflicts 
of  the  two  parties  which  in  the  earlier  years  of  the 
century  had  caused  so  much  blood  to  flow  in 
revolutions  and  in  European  wars!  Towards 
1900  in  France,  in  Italy,  and  a  little  later  in 
England,  the  middle  classes  and  the  masses  came 
into  power  with  the  democratic  parties.  In  other 
countries,  such  as  Germany,  the  autocracy  and 
the  wealthy  bourgeoisie  kept  the  reins  of  govern- 
ment firmly  in  their  hands  up  till  1914.  But  in  all 
countries   the   conquered   party   reconciled   itself 


The  German  Peace  207 

to  defeat  without  too  much  bitterness,  while  the 
victorious  party  did  not  abuse  its  victory,  and  in 
the  end  they  all  governed,  better  or  worse,  but 
with  very  much  the  same  objects. 

Since  1848  Europe  had  changed  beyond  recogni- 
tion. Who  now  remembered  the  men,  the  doc- 
trines, the  heroisms,  the  follies  of  that  great  year? 
Already  discredited  by  the  triumph  of  Germany, 
by  the  bitter  rivalries  of  the  European  States,  the 
generous  aspirations  of  1848  were  smothered,  even 
in  the  democratic  countries,  by  the  congestion  of 
wealth.  In  the  midst  of  the  ruins  of  so  many 
traditions  and  so  much  idealism,  in  every  part  of 
Europe  except  where,  as  in  Austria-Hungary,  the 
racial  and  linguistic  struggle  still  went  on,  there 
was  but  one  passion  which  now  exalted,  moved, 
and  confounded  all  classes  and  all  parties — the 
passion  for  progress  which  was  nothing  else  than 
the  new  cult  of  steel  and  fire,  the  attainment  of 
riches  and  power  by  means  of  science  and  ma- 
chinery. After  doubting  for  long  whether  to  adore 
or  to  curse  the  potent  engines  of  iron  animated  by 
fire  which  man  had  been  creating  for  a  century, 
Europe,  after  1870,  had  ended  by  being  vanquished 
and  convinced  of  their  divine  power  and  by 
believing  that  they  were  indeed  divine.  Though 
they  corrupted  and  spoiled  much  that  was  beauti- 


208  Problems  of  Peace 

ful  in  the  old  civilization,  and  reduced  to  slavery 
the  men  who  had  created  them  to  be  their  slaves, 
they  did  in  fact  produce  abundance,  the  abun- 
dance longed  for  by  the  multitudes  which  had  for 
centuries  been  stinted ! 

Little  by  little  every  one,  men,  women,  rich  and 
poor,  great  and  small,  abandoned  themselves  to 
their  power.  They  served  night  and  day,  so 
inebriated  with  their  slaverj^  that  they  called  them 
by  fine  names,  and  proudly  displayed  their  fetters 
to  the  astonished  peoples  of  Asia  as  if  they  had 
been  splendid  ornaments  which  were  a  glory  for 
the  human  race.  They  sacrificed  to  these  new 
idols  everything,  such  as  reason,  beauty,  and  the 
nobiHty  of  life — which  had  been  admired  and 
sought  after  for  centuries.  Every  year  public  and 
private  expenditure,  the  needs  of  all  classes,  the 
thirst  for  gain  and  useless  consumption  increased, 
and,  with  these,  a  satiety  even  to  nausea  among  all 
civilized  peoples  and  decent  citizens,  for  other- 
wise what  could  be  the  object  of  increasing  pro- 
duction? The  more  the  number  and  the  power 
of  the  machines  increased  the  more  hours  men 
had  to  steal  from  sleep  and  rest,  the  more  they 
had  to  exliaust  themselves  in  the  mad  struggle 
for  increased  production  and  consumption.  How 
proud  they  were,  nevertheless,  when  one  of  their 


The  German  Peace  209 

number  invented  some  new,  more  powerful  and 
more  rapid  machine  which  would  increase  the 
universal  torment!  And  with  what  garlands  was 
the  fortunate  inventor  crowned ! 

The  German  People  set  an  example  to  all  nations 
of  fervent  pursuit  of  the  new  cult.  Every  year 
their  population  grew  and  soon  left  France  far 
behind  in  the  rivalry  of  numbers.  They  laboured 
indefatigably  to  secure  the  lead  in  metal-working 
among  all  the  Powers  and  in  1900  they  had  already 
smelted  eight  milHon  tons  of  iron  against  England's 
nine.  They  exaggerated  the  principle  of  increas- 
ing quantity  at  the  expense  of  quality,  and  were 
determined  to  conquer  in  industry  as  they  had 
done  in  war  by  force  of  numbers.  To  produce, 
produce,  and  still  produce;  to  increase  without 
rest  the  old  industries  and  to  multiply  new  ones, 
either  original  or  copies;  to  elimJnate  handiwork 
and  human  skiU  by  means  of  machinery,  and  nature 
with  its  parsimonious  perfections  by  means  of 
drugs,  dyes,  and  chemical  substitutes;  to  make 
everything  cheap  by  increasing  its  quantity;  to 
oblige  men  to  live  in  plenty  and  consume  largely 
while  deceiving  them  with  clever  falsifications, 
sold  sometimes  at  a  loss;  to  tempt  savages  and 
civihzed  races,  old  peoples  and  new,  by  cheap 
and  flashy  goods,  imitations  which  appealed  to  the 


14 


210  Problems  of  Peace 

mania  for  novelty — all  these  prosaic  operations  of 
commerce  underwent  a  sort  of  transfiguration  in 
Germany  and  became  a  national  mission  which  it 
was  the  duty  of  the  State  to  help  and  to  direct. 

Between  1900  and  1914,  Europe  and  America 
vied  with  each  other  in  admiring  this  people 
which,  after  winning  three  wars  in  less  than  ten 
years,  had  grown  by  nearly  a  third  in  little  more 
than  three  decades,  which  had  launched  the  second 
mercantile  fleet  and  the  second  navy  in  the  world, 
which  had  reached  the  head  of  the  metallurgical 
industry  in  Europe — in  1910  Germany  produced 
15  million  tons  of  iron,  England  10  millions,  and 
France  4  millions;  which  was  disputing  England's 
industrial  supremacy  and  whose  diplomatists,  mer- 
chants, commercial  travellers,  professors,  books, 
bankers,  ships  were  making  themselves  felt  in 
every  quarter  of  the  globe!  Democracies  and 
aristocracies,  monarchies  and  republics  vied  with 
each  other  in  zeal  for  the  new  religion.  All  ad- 
mired and  took  Germany  for  a  model  even  when 
there  was  the  gravest  reason  to  distrust  her. 
Democratic  and  conservative  parties  were  quarrel- 
ling for  the  most  part  about  words ;  there  was  only 
one  point  of  real  difference  between  them.  The 
democrats  wished  to  unite  the  cult  of  fire  with  the 
cult  of  peace;  the  conservatives  held  to  the  mili- 


The  German  Peace  211 

tary  tradition  of  the  nineteenth  century.  The 
parties  and  the  governments  who  wished  for  a 
world  peace  felt  a  certain  aversion  from  the  Power 
which  had  three  times  attacked  its  neighbours  and 
had  imposed  on  Europe  unlimited  competition  in 
armaments.  But  Germany  had  sheathed  the  sword 
for  so  many  years  and  had  sworn  so  emphati- 
cally not  to  draw  it  ever  again !  Thus  her  growing 
power  helped  Germany  where  the  conservatives 
were  in  power  without  damaging  her  in  the  coun- 
tries which  were  under  the  control  of  too  forgetful 
and  trustful  democrats. 

Little  by  little,  without  knowing  it,  som.etimes 
even  against  its  will  or  even  while  actually  cursing 
Germany,  Europe  became  Germanized.  This  was 
not  due  to  the  somewhat  antiquated  prestige  of 
the  German  arms,  but  because  in  the  new  quanti- 
tative, mechanical,  and  democratic  civilization 
only  numbers  could  fill  the  now  innumerable 
barracks,  express  the  will  of  the  people  as  the 
suffrage  was  enlarged,  or  supply  the  hands  and 
the  customers  which  were  required  by  industry 
on  the  grand  scale.  The  nation  which  had  best 
understood  how  to  temper  and  to  use  the  new 
weapon  of  numbers  necessarily  appeared  to  be  a 
model  nation  as  in  the  strife  for  power  and  riches 
the  old  ideals,   which   aimed   at   quality  rather 


212  Problems  of  Peace 

than  quantity  and  perfection  rather  than  power, 
became  gradually  obscured.  Numbers,  however, 
were  now  represented  by  the  numerous  classes,  the 
bourgeoisie  and  the  people.  The  quantitative  civ- 
ilization therefore  grew  with  the  growth  of  com- 
fort and  education,  and  with  the  power  of  the 
middle  class  and  of  the  masses,  more  rapidly  in 
the  States  which  had  representative  government, 
but  more  or  less  in  all.  The  growing  power  of 
these  classes  is  one  of  the  most  striking  phenomena 
in  the  history  of  Europe  during  the  last  half  cen- 
tury, and  it  was  universal  everywhere,  Russia 
herself  being  no  exception  to  the  general  rule. 
The  effects,  however,  were  different  in  Austria- 
Hungary,  in  the  parliamentary  democracies  of 
the  West,  and  in  Germany. 

In  Austria-Hungary  the  number  of  enemies  of 
the  State  increased  because  the  new  spirit  rein- 
forced the  opposition  of  the  nationalities  to  the 
hegemony  of  the  Germans  and  the  Magyars  in 
those  parts  of  the  Empire  in  which  the  Hapsburgs 
possessed  no  indisputable  title  of  legitimacy  but 
force,  as  was  the  case  in  Bohemia,  among  the 
Southern  Slavs,  and  in  the  Italian  provinces.  In 
Bohemia  industry  was  becoming  wealthy  and  the 
schools  were  bringing  up  a  middle  class  which  was 
no  longer  content  to  figure  as  clients,  however  well 


The  German  Peace  213 

remunerated,  of  the  German  aristocracy  of  Vienna 
or  the  Germanized  aristocracy  of  Prague.  The 
same  revulsion  of  feeling  had  taken  place,  though 
in  a  less  degree,  among  the  Southern  Slavs.  The 
national  movements  in  the  Austrian  Empire  were 
opposed  not  only  to  the  German  and  Magyar 
hegemony,  but  also  to  the  aristocratic  constitution 
of  the  Empire  which  was  the  foundation  of  that 
hegemony.  Hence  there  was  a  threatening  up- 
heaval of  parties,  of  peoples,  and  of  races,  which 
filled  parliament  and  the  States  with  confusion 
and  shook  the  Empire  to  its  foundations.  In  the 
democratic  parliaments  of  the  West,  on  the  con- 
trary, the  leaders  and  the  parties  of  the  m.iddle 
and  popular  classes  had  been  easily  and  promptly 
absorbed  into  the  Government,  though  not  with 
all  their  views.  After  1900,  especially,  they  had 
gained  a  large  share  of  power,  in  France  through 
the  Radical  party,  in  Italy  under  the  long  dictator- 
ship of  Giolitti,  in  England  in  the  first  Liberal 
ministry  of  the  reign  of  Edward  VII.  In  all 
three  countries  there  was  a  concurrent  growth  of  the 
influence  of  the  Labour  and  Socialist  parties. 
These  influences  weakened  the  State,  though  they 
were  not  hostile  to  it  as  in  Austria-Hungary-,  and 
even  supported  it  by  their  contradictory  aspira- 
tions.    It  was  characteristic  of  the  middle  and 


214  Problems  of  Peace 

lower  classes  before  the  war  that  they  confounded 
the  principles  of  the  Holy  Alliance  and  of  the 
Revolution  so  completely  that  they  were  mutually 
cancelled  out.  All  over  Europe  except  in  Ger- 
many these  classes  were  averse  to  militarism 
and  wished  only  for  peace  and  secure  prosperity. 
They  were  also  liable,  however,  to  occasional 
attacks  of  bellicose  frenzy,  such  as  the  hysterical 
convulsion  of  jingoism  which  swept  through  Eng- 
land at  the  time  of  the  South  African  War  or 
the  Imperialistic  exaltation  which  in  191 1  drove 
Italy  to  the  Tripolitan  coast.  A  series  of  govern- 
ments began,  called  democratic,  progressive,  radi- 
cal, and  so  on,  which  spent  money  freely,  were  not 
too  rigorous  or  authoritarian,  and  did  not  insist 
too  much  on  respect  and  deference.  Their  lead- 
ers might  on  occasion  be  severely  criticized  and 
abused.  But  the  nations  had  for  centuries  been 
too  much  accustomed  to  obey  not  to  desire  the 
benefits  of  strong  government;  hence  their  ad- 
miration for  the  German  State  system,  and  their 
mania  for  imitating  many  German  institutions 
which  were  living  and  fruitful  in  Germany  but 
which,  when  transplanted  to  democratic  States, 
languished  or  became  positively  mischievous. 

In  Germany,  on  the  contrary,  while  the  growing 
numbers  of  the  population  reinforced  the  socialist 


The  German  Peace  215 

party,  the  middle  classes  reinforced  the   govern- 
ment because  until  1914  they  remained,  with  some 
hesitation  occasionally,  submissive  to  the  dynas- 
ties, the  aristocracy,  and  the  bureaucracy.     The 
reason  for  this  was  that  the  government  looked 
after  their  material  interests,  flattered  their  pride, 
and  excited  their  cupidity  and  ambition.     The 
more  Germanized  Europe  became,  the  more  it 
was   weakened    in    comparison    with    Germany, 
because  it  was  involved  in  a  contest  in  which 
Germany  had  all  the  advantages.     France  lacked 
men,  Italy  coal  and  military  traditions.     Russia 
had  a  scattered  population,  no   industries,  and 
no  education.     England  was  wanting  in  armies 
and  administrative  efficiency.    Thus,  while  other 
peoples    made    themselves    miserable    with    the 
thought  of  their  imperfections,  the  German  tribes 
exulted  in  the  belief  that  they  were  the  master- 
piece of  the  universe,  and  got  into  the  habit  of 
despising   other   nations.     France   was    corrupt, 
Russia  barbarous,  Italy  frivolous,  England  out  of 
date.     Nor  were  there  wanting  people  who  en- 
couraged these  sentiments.     About  1895  there  be- 
gan to  appear  in  great  numbers  in  Germany  books 
and  pamphlets  demonstrating  that  the  German 
people,  being  the  most  capable,  had  the  right  to 
take  from  other  peoples  anything  that  they  thought 


2i6  Problems  of  Peace 

necessary  to  enable  them  to  live  generously  and 
to  dominate  and  remake  the  world  in  their  own 
image.  Numerous  and  powerful  societies  made  it 
their  object  to  diffuse  these  doctrines  among  the 
educated  middle  classes,  whose  devotion  to  the 
Empire  and  the  Emperor  was  continually  stimu- 
lated by  the  hopes  excited  by  this  teaching, 
hopes  which,  in  spite  of  the  frequent  oscillations 
of  the  Imperial  policy,  founded  themselves  con- 
fidently on  the  new  Bismarck,  the  man  who  would 
raise  to  undreamed-of  heights  the  power  of  Ger- 
many already  so  great  in  Europe.  Meanv/hile  they 
did  what  they  were  told. 

Thus  Europe,  always  intent  on  increasing  its 
riches,  always  at  war  with  itself  and  contradictory 
in  its  wishes,  exhausted  itself  in  feverish  unrest. 
Between  1895  and  1905  almost  all  the  European 
States,  like  Germany,  and  partly  in  deliberate 
imitation  of  Germany,  tried  all  sorts  of  new  com- 
binations which  sometimes  appeared  certain  to 
alter  profoundly  the  political  situation,  but  which 
in  the  end  effected  little  or  nothing.  The  fear  of 
war  which  had  prevented  Europe  having  a  min- 
ute's peace  between  1870  and  1890  was  almost 
gone,  and  all  governments  wanted  peace.  Was 
it  not  absurd,  then,  to  continue  the  unlimited 
rivalry  of  armaments  which  weighed  so  heavily 


The  German  Peace  217 

on  all  States?  Nicholas  II.  in  1898  invited  the 
States  of  Europe  to  concert  disarmament,  and  a 
great  conference  met  at  The  Hague  which  debated 
and  deliberated  the  question  for  months  and 
ended  in  the  signing  of  protocols.  Then  the 
struggle  began  more  bitterly  than  ever.  Germany, 
intensifying  her  exaggerations  of  the  principle  of 
the  nation  in  arms,  introduced  two  years'  service, 
did  everything  in  her  power  to  increase  her  in- 
dustrial production,  to  perfect  her  old  engines  of 
war  and  to  invent  new  ones,  and  her  shipyards 
worked  day  and  night  to  increase  her  fleet .  Nicho- 
las II.,  after  having  proposed  a  league  for  the  peace 
of  Europe,  yielded  to  the  insatiable  hunger  for 
territories  which  possessed  his  government  and 
undertook  a  ruinous  and  disastrous  war  with 
Japan  for  the  possession  of  Corea,  as  if  the  Russian 
Empire  was  not  large  enough  already. 

A  new  crisis  was  brewing  in  the  East  where 
the  Christian  populations,  still  groaning  under  the 
Turkish  yoke,  were  agitating,  as  Italy  had  agitated 
between  1815  and  1848,  for  the  right  to  live. 
Crete  had  rebelled  and  from  this  rebellion  de- 
veloped awar  between  Greece  and  Turkey  in  1897. 
But  the  affairs  of  Macedonia  were  even  more  dis- 
turbed, for  there  Bulgars,  Greeks,  and  Serbians, 
secretly  supported  by  their  national  governments, 


21 8  Problems  of  Peace 

rebelled  against  the  authority  of  the  Sultan  and  at 
the  same  time  waged  a  war  of  mutual  extermina- 
tion.    What  did  Europe  do?     In  1897,  Austria 
and  Russia  came  to  an  agreement  guaranteeing 
the  status  quo  whereby  they  pledged  themselves 
to  leave  the  disease  without  a  cure.    And  the 
only  thing  that  the  rest  of  Europe  troubled  about 
was  whether   this  agreement  would   weaken   or 
strengthen  the  Triple  Alliance.     Italy,  which  for 
some  time  had  been  once  more  drawing  nearer 
to  France,  was  somewhat  eclipsed,  and  made  a 
special  agreement  with  Austria  on  the  subject  of 
Albania.     France,  which  during  recent  years  had 
been  the  object  of  the  lavish  courtesies  and  at- 
tentions of  Germany,  seemed  on  the  point  of  a 
mortal  quarrel  with  England  about  Fashoda.     At 
this  time  Germany  and  England  were  friendly  and 
concluded  a  secret  treaty  about  the  Portuguese 
Colonies   and   another   treaty    guaranteeing    the 
integrity  of  China  and  freedom  of  trade  at  the 
river  and  maritime  ports  of  the  Celestial  Empire. 
In  England,  indeed,  very  influential  personages 
were  actually  discussing  a  plan  of  alhance  between 
England,  Germany,  and  America.    In  Italy,  finally, 
Prinetti,  the  first  Foreign  Minister  of  Victor  Em- 
manuel III.,  who  had  now  ascended  the  throne, 
was  extremely  hostile  to  the  Triple  Alliance.    The 


The  German  Peace  219 

King's  first  official  journey  was  to  St.  Petersburg, 
and  one  of  the  first  important  acts  of  the  new 
reign  was  the  agreement  of  1902,  whereby  France 
left  Italy  a  free  hand  in  Tripoli  and  Italy  left 
a  free  hand  to  France  in  Morocco.  Italy  and 
France  forgot  the  collision  over  Tunis  and  forgave 
each  other  their  reciprocal  causes  of  offence  during 
the  past  twenty  years,  dividing  between  themselves 
in  idea  on  the  map  territories  which  neither  had 
any  idea  of  occupying  at  that  time.  This  agree- 
ment did  not  prevent  Italy  from  renewing  the 
Triple  Alliance  in  1902.  This  step  did  not  disturb 
her  good  relations  with  France  who,  on  the  con- 
trary, officially  declared  herself  satisfied,  nor  did 
it  prevent  the  renewal  in  Italy  of  the  Irredentist 
agitation  w^hich  had  for  so  many  years  been 
quiescent. 

The  alliances  and  agreements  of  the  European 
Powers  were  now  very  numerous  and  complicated, 
and  the  field  for  understandings  and  contests 
much  increased.  The  possible  combinations  were 
so  many,  so  various,  and  often  so  vague  and  there- 
fore so  easy  to  bring  about,  all  the  States  were  so 
anxious  not  to  disturb  the  peace,  that  the  old 
rivalries  seemed  to  have  subsided  into  a  constant 
movement  of  new  combinations  which  were  all 
the  easier  to  form,  as  practically  all  of  them  were 


220  Problems  of  Peace 

more  concerned  with  seizing  future  than  present 
advantages.  The  future  was  like  an  unexplored 
continent,  easy  to  partition  in  a  friendly  way 
precisely  because  its  extent  and  boundaries  were 
little  known.  The  old  enmities,  however,  were 
not  dead;  they  went  on  smouldering  under  the 
protocols  which  reconciled  the  Powers  to  each 
other  by  dividing  up  Asia  and  Africa  among  them 
in  the  future.  The  nation  which  stirred  the  fire 
and  reawakened  it  below  this  heap  of  treaties 
was  Germany,  the  strong  nation  which  regarded 
itself  as  first  in  the  world,  and  destined  to  become 
a  world  power. 

When  he  ascended  the  British  Throne,  Edward 
VII.  made  it  his  business  to  rouse  England  which 
was  slumbering  profoundly  while  Germany  in 
the  darkness  was  sharpening  a  knife  with  which 
to  stab  her  as  she  slept.  Alarmed  by  the  power 
and  the  ambitions  of  Germany,  Edward  VII, 
wished  to  counteract  them  by  a  sincere  and  dur- 
able understanding  between  England  and  France. 
He  was  successful,  and  in  1904  England  concluded 
with  France  an  agreement  liquidating  all  the 
Colonial  questions  which  had  divided  the  two 
countries  for  so  many  years,  and  which  a  few 
years  before  would  have  seemed  impossible.  But 
the  time  was  ripe  for  it.   Russia  had  been  weakened 


The  German  Peace  221 

in  Europe  by  the  war  which  she  was  fighting 
against  Japan,  and  France  had  to  seek  for  some 
reinforcement  of  the  Russian  AlHance  in  order 
to  maintain  the  equilibrium  of  Europe.  She  was 
therefore  at  the  parting  of  the  ways  of  reconciU- 
ation  either  with  England  or  with  Germany.  The 
memory  of  Alsace-Lorraine  barred  the  way  to 
a  reconciliation  with  Germany,  and  France  and 
England  came  to  terms.  The  result  was  that 
France,  as  practically  the  ally  of  England,  actually 
the  ally  of  Russia,  and  the  friend  of  Italy,  suddenly 
found  herself,  to  her  ow^n  surprise  and  that  of 
Europe,  once  more  the  pivot  of  the  great  com- 
binations of  world  policy  and  in  the  position  to 
which  Germany  had  aspired  with  impetuous  am- 
bition for  fifteen  years.  The  game  which  Bis- 
marck invented  of  embittering  colonial  rivalries  in 
order  to  dominate  Europe  had  so  tiu-ned  out  that 
in  the  end  it  was  France  who,  having  risked  little 
or  nothing,  was  the  winner.  Germany  did  not  take 
this  caprice  of  fortune  well.  She  lost  her  temper 
and  latinched  her  first  defiance  at  Europe. 

The  historic  crisis  which  came  to  a  head  in  the 
world  war  began  in  the  spring  of  1905  with  the 
famous  landing  at  Tangier  and  the  still  more 
famous  speech  of  the  Emperor  William  on  that 
occasion.     When  France  reconciled  herself  w^ith 


222  Problems  of  Peace 

England  in  1904,  she  had  abandoned  Egypt, 
and  England  in  return  had  resigned  all  interest  in 
the  affairs  of  Morocco  in  favour  of  France.  By 
suddenly  appearing  in  x^frica  in  the  guise  of  the 
Protector  of  Islam  and  of  the  independence  of 
Morocco  William  II.  intimated  to  France  and 
England  that  their  agreements  were  useless  scraps 
of  paper  unless  they  were  countersigned  by  Ger- 
many. This  was  an  open  challenge.  It  was  not 
accepted  by  France  and  England  because,  Russia 
being  paralysed,  they  felt  themselves  to  be  too 
weak  on  land.  Germany  on  her  side  did  not  push 
things  to  the  point  of  going  to  war,  because  she 
knew  that  she  was  the  weaker  party  at  sea.  An 
agreement,  therefore,  was  reached.  The  Entente 
gave  way  by  recognizing  that  not  only  England 
and  France  but  the  whole  of  Europe  had  the  right 
to  decide  the  fate  of  Morocco.  Germany  was 
satisfied  by  the  summoning  of  a  European  Con- 
gress at  Algeciras  at  which  several  European 
Powers  were  to  be  represented  who  had  as  much 
interest  in  Morocco  as  in  the  planet  Mars.  The 
Congress  met,  and,  in  order  not  to  irritate  Germany 
while  not  allowing  her  to  win  at  all  points,  drew 
up  a  highly  ingenious  international  statute  recog- 
nizing that  France  and  Spain  had  special  rights 
and  privileges  in  Moroccan  affairs,  but  limiting 


The  German  Peace  223 

these  by  so  many  restrictions  and  obligations  in 
favour  of  the  other  Powers  that  the  Treaty  became 
one  mass  of  quibbles  which  bad  faith  and  bullying 
could  turn  to  advantage  at  any  time. 

From  this  ferocious  challenge  dated  the  begin- 
ning of  the  troubled  twilight  of  the  German  peace. 
How  strange  and  disturbed  these  years  now  seem 
as  viewed  from  the  bottom  of  the  abyss  into 
which  we  fell!  Riches  increased  like  a  flood  of 
slime  covering  the  world.  There  were  no  doubters 
now;  steel  and  fire  were  indeed  the  new  divinities 
of  plenty  and  power.  All  the  fetters  which  had  at 
first  encumbered  the  advance  of  the  machine  were 
broken.  Machines  grew  more  feverish  in  their 
speed  imtil  finally  they  took  flight  from  the  earth 
and  appeared  to  have  vanquished  the  laws  of 
gravitation  and  the  parsimony  of  Nature,  and  to 
have  annulled  time  as  well  as  space.  Intoxicated 
by  their  successes,  men  worshipped  and  slaved 
for  them  more  than  ever.  Kings  and  workmen, 
aristocrats  and  bourgeois,  poets  and  philosophers 
crowded  about  the  idols  and  their  priests,  no 
longer  fearing  them  but  admiring  them  precisely 
because,  by  means  of  the  power  which  had  appar- 
ently no  limits,  they  fondly  hoped  to  set  at  nought 
the  boimdaries  beyond  which  thought  and  morals 
and  social  organization  cease  to  be  possible.     The 


224  Problems  of  Peace 

more  riches  increased  the  more  great  and  small 
felt  themselves  to  be  in  want ;  they  bowed  them- 
selves to  new  and  even  more  arduous  labour  in 
order  to  slake  the  thirst  which  returned  upon  them 
as  they  drank,  and  they  disquieted  the  world  with 
an  unrest  which  grew  more  bitter  with  every 
effort  that  was  made  to  soothe  it.  From  this 
universal  restlessness,  from  pride  and  overcon- 
fidence,  ignorance  and  half-knowledge,  there 
developed  among  the  middle  classes  and  in  the 
mass  of  the  people  a  spirit  of  hatred,  ambition,  and 
unstable  delusions  often  self-contradictory  not 
to  say  insane.  To  this  the  upper  classes,  divided 
as  they  were  among  themselves,  desorientes  and 
infected  with  the  same  megalomania  themselves, 
could  only  oppose  an  indulgent  acquiescence, 
when  they  were  unable  to  use  force  as  in  Russia 
they  attempted  to  do.  Thus  the  States,  unable 
to  resist  these  impulses  or  to  push  them  to  their 
logical  conclusions,  lived  from  hand  to  mouth, 
juggling  with  opposing  principles  in  order  to  please 
everybody,  doing  everything  by  halves,  and  when 
they  wished  to  carry  out  some  measure  of  reform 
copying  some  German  institution. 

After  reconciling  herself  w^th  France,  England 
skilfully  took  advantage  of  the  defeats  suffered 
by  Russia  in  the  Far  East  in  order  to  reconcile 


The  German  Peace  225 

herself  also  with  the  Muscovite  Empire  and  to 
reply  to  the  challenge  thrown  at  her  and  France 
by  Germany  in  1905  by  opposing  the  Triple 
AUiance  with  the  Triple  Entente.  She  could 
not,  however,  go  further  and  equip  an  army  for 
intervention  in  a  Continental  war.  The  nation 
did  not  want  new  things,  new  burdens,  and  new 
sources  of  anxiety.  Many  by  tradition  still  felt 
more  distrustful  of  France  than  of  Germany.  The 
Liberal  and  Radical  party  which  was  in  power 
wished  to  limit  armaments  and  were  under  the 
illusion  that  they  could  come  to  terms  with 
Germany  whence  they  had  borrowed  several  social 
reforms  such  as  workmen's  pensions.  France 
was  convulsed  with  extremely  bitter  political  and 
social  conflicts  on  the  subject  of  reforms  proposed 
by  the  radical  party,  some  of  which  introduced 
into  France  institutions  in  force  in  Germany,  such 
as  two  years'  military  service,  workmen's  pensions, 
income  tax,  and  State  railways.  She  was  tortured 
by  doubts  whether  the  time  was  not  come  to  forget 
the  two  daughters  torn  from  her  in  1871,  and  to 
make  peace  with  their  ravisher,  or  whether  she 
should  continue  to  cherish  in  her  heart  the  flame 
of  implacable  resentment.  The  Treaty  of  Alge- 
ciras,  which  had  been  drawn  up  with  so  much 
trouble,  became  a  source  of  torture  to  her.      In 

IS 


226  Problems  of  Peace 

each  of  its  articles  Germany  discovered  every  day 
some  new  pretext  for  quibbling  and  bullying,  for 
new  claims  and  for  open  or  covert  threats  which 
exasperated  the  fiery  Gallic  temper.  Even  war 
was  preferable  to  submission  to  such  tyranny! 
But  the  threats  were  interspersed  with  amiable 
words  and  smiles,  protestations  of  friendship,  and 
veiled  invitations  to  conclude  a  definitive  agree- 
ment which,  by  uniting  the  two  greatest  States 
of  Continental  Europe  for  peace,  would  bring  peace 
to  the  whole  world.  France,  therefore,  feeling  her- 
self every  year  more  overpowered  by  the  num- 
bers of  her  enemies,  asked  herself  whether  she  was 
wise  to  persist  in  a  hatred  which  was  vain  and 
indeed  dangerous  both  for  herself  and  for  Europe, 
since  the  power  to  gratify  it  was  lacking. 

Impressed  by  the  defeats  of  Russia,  Italy  had 
somewhat  cooled  in  her  desire  for  new  combina- 
tions, and,  while  she  did  not  cease  to  cultivate  the 
valuable  friendship  of  France  and  England,  she 
decided  to  regard  the  Triple  Alhance  as  a  perma- 
nency and  did  her  best  to  make  friends  with 
Austria  by  damping  down  once  more  the  Irre- 
dentist agitation.  But  though  she  wished  for  peace 
and,  in  order  to  conciliate  the  masses,  did  her  best 
to  limit  her  military  expenses  and  obligations,  she 
had  attached  herself  to  an  alliance  which  after  1905 


The  German  Peace  227 

was  preparing  for  war.  Russia,  finally,  was  at  grips 
with  Revolution  after  the  Japanese  war,  and  was 
reconstituting  her  army  as  best  she  could.  While, 
therefore,  she  was  united  to  France  and  England 
owing  to  her  need  of  money  and  assistance,  she 
drew  nearer  to  Germany  owing  to  her  fear  of  the 
Revolutionaries. 

One  Power  alone  stood  solidly  entrenched  be- 
hind the  triple  fortifications  of  a  monarchical, 
aristocratic,  and  military  system,  a  resolutely 
aggressive  national  pride,  and  a  megalomania 
destined  to  increase  till  it  became  suicidal.  In 
the  nine  years  between  1905  and  1914,  between 
the  first  and  the  final  defiance,  Germany  alone 
among  the  great  States  of  Europe  was  not  weak- 
ened and  disunited  by  the  progressive  develop- 
ment of  industry  and  the  growing  power  of  the 
middle  classes  and  the  mass  of  the  people.  While 
in  other  States  armaments  were  the  greatest 
burden  on  the  governments  which  had  great 
difficulty  in  overcoming  the  doubts  and  reluctance 
of  legislatures  when  there  was  any  question  of 
increase  of  the  Army  or  the  Navy,  German}^ 
continued  resolutely  to  increase  her  army  as  much 
as  she  could,  and  to  re-equip  it  with  new  and  more 
powerful  weapons.  The  Army  was  more  and  more 
closely   associated   with   Industry,    elsewhere  so 


228  Problems  of  Peace 

distrustfiil  of  the  military  element  if  not  actually 
hostile  to  it.  Industry  was  incited  to  invent 
new  weapons  and  instruments  of  war  of  imheard- 
of  power.  The  Army,  on  the  other  hand,  was 
secretly  trained  to  act  in  the  forthcoming  struggles 
as  the  armed  agent  of  Industry. 

Other  States  were  content  to  follow,  some 
months  later  and  against  their  will,  the  impetuous 
initiative  of  Germany.  While  in  all  other  Euro- 
pean nations.  Trade,  Industry,  Finance,  Education, 
the  Press,  and  Diplomacy  fulfilled  each  its  proper 
function  without  reference  to  the  rest,  the  German 
Government  spared  no  pains  to  gather  up  all  these 
separate  activities  and  unite  them  in  a  single 
concerted  activity  w^hose  object  was  to  serve  the 
ambitions  and  increase  the  power  of  Germany. 
France,  England,  and  Russia  were  intimidated  and 
took  pains  not  to  offend  and  even  to  conciliate  this 
restless  Power.  England  sent  peace  missions  to 
Germany  to  propose  a  partial  disarmament.  The 
Czar  followed  with  complete  docility  the  advice  of 
William  II.  and  the  Russian  government  allowed 
itself  to  be  more  completely  overcome  every  day 
by  the  German  invasion.  In  France  the  socialist 
party  was  offering  the  German  people  forgiveness 
and  forgetfulness  of  past  injuries.  But  through- 
out Germany  never  ceased  to  try  the  patience  of 


The  German  Peace  229 

France  by  quibbling  over  the  Treaty  of  Algeciras 
and  seizing  every  opportunity  of  raising  diplo- 
matic difficulties  of  every  sort.  And  when  a  new 
opportunity  arose  of  defying  the  Entente,  this 
time  in  the  person  of  Russia,  she  did  not  let  it 
slip. 

This  opportunity  arose  out  of  the  Eastern 
Question.  In  Macedonia  things  were  every  year 
going  rapidly  from  bad  to  worse.  The  Christian 
population  never  ceased  to  rebel  against  the 
Sultan  and  at  the  same  time  continued  to  ex- 
terminate each  other  with  ever-growing  ferocity. 
The  Turkish  Government  was  powerless  to  restore 
order.  The  Balkan  States  were  all  agitated,  each 
wishing  at  the  same  time  to  help  its  nationals 
in  Macedonia  and  to  prevent  other  States  from 
doing  the  same.  The  Powers  of  Europe,  fearing  a 
catastrophe  and  suspecting  each  other,  intervened 
with  mild  expedients  such  as  the  organization  of  a 
European  gendarmerie,  which  wounded  Turkish 
self-esteem  without  pacifying  Macedonia.  In  the 
end  the  Turkish  Army,  humiliated  by  European 
intervention,  irregularly  paid  by  a  clever  but 
avaricious  Sultan,  who  was  too  astute  and  too 
confident  in  his  own  astuteness,  mutinied.  In 
July,  1908,  a  miHtary  revolution  at  Constantinople 
deposed  Abdul  Hamid.     This  revolution,  which 


230  Problems  of  Peace 

had  been  planned  in  the  Masonic  Lodges  of  Salo- 
nica  by  the  party  of  the  Young  Turks,  declared 
itself  to  be  a  zealous  disciple  of  the  French  Revolu- 
tion, and  announced  its  intention  of  regenerating 
and  Westernizing  the  Empire  by  means  of  repre- 
sentative institutions,  of  freeing  all  the  former 
subjects  of  the  Sultan,  giving  autonomy  to  all  the 
provinces,  and  granting  equality  of  rights  and 
duties  to  Christian  and  Moslem  alike. 

The  Western  democracies  were  delighted, 
imagining  that  in  the  East  feudal  Germany  had 
lost  the  toilsome  acquisitions  of  twenty  years' 
hard  work.  But  the  Turkish  Revolution  was 
really  only  the  beginning  of  a  European  crisis 
at  the  end  of  which  Germany  was  more  power- 
ful than  ever  in  Turkey.  The  Austro-Hungarian 
Empire  had  long  been  awaiting  its  chance  to  show 
that  it  was  still  strong  enough,  not  merely  to  keep 
what  it  had,  but  to  take  the  property  of  others. 
The  Turkish  Revolution  provided  the  opportunity 
to  annex  Bosnia  and  Herzegovina,  the  two  Turkish 
provinces  which  the  Congress  of  Berlin  had  handed 
over  to  Austria  to  be  "administered"  under  the 
sovereignty  of  the  Sultan.  Since  all  the  provinces 
of  the  Ottoman  Empire  now  formed  part  of  a 
constitutional  State,  the  Austro-Hungarian  Gov- 
ernment recognized  that  Bosnia  and  Herzegovina 


The  German  Peace  231 

had  the  right  to  be  equally  fortunate.  Accord- 
ingly they  declared  themselves  prepared  to  receive 
the  provinces  on  an  equal  footing  with  the  rest  of 
the  family  of  States  within  the  Empire.  But  how 
could  this  be  done  until  they  were  annexed? 
The  pretext  was  ingenious,  but  also  sophistical, 
and  at  first  everybody  thought  that  there  would 
be  a  fierce  struggle  between  the  Young  Turks  and 
the  Central  Empires.  But,  after  making  some 
difficulties  and  receiving  certain  compensations, 
the  Young  Turks  resigned  themselves  to  the 
sacrifice,  and  the  conflict  which  did  arise  was 
between  Slavs  and  Germans. 

The  little  Kingdom  of  Serbia  was  distressed  by 
the  fate  of  Bosnia  and  Herzegovina  inhabited  by 
men  of  Serbian  race,  protested,  threatened  war, 
and  stirred  up  Russia  whose  eyes  were  again  turn- 
ing towards  the  Balkans  and  the  Slav-  peoples 
there  who  were  threatened  with  Germanization. 
For  a  moment  it  seemed  as  if  little  Serbia,  backed 
up  by  Russia,  was  about  to  sling  a  stone  at  the 
Austrian  Goliath  as  the  tiny  Kingdom  of  Pied- 
mont supported  by  France  had  done  fifty  years 
before.  But  Germany  intervened  and,  as  in 
1905,  launched  a  defiance,  threatening  Russia 
with  war.  For  the  second  time  the  Entente  gave 
way. 


232  Problems  of  Peace 

Germany  was  virtually  the  dictator  of  Europe, 
for  France,  England,  and  Russia  had  not  dared 
to  resist  her  threats  with  their  united  strength. 
England  was,  however,  posted  in  Egypt.  Russia 
was  the  immemorial  enemy  of  Tiirkey,  and 
France  the  loyal  ally  of  Russia.  Between  the 
rival  European  Powers  the  Young  Turks  did  not 
hesitate  long.  They  made  a  closer  league  with 
Germany  than  the  old  Turks  had  ever  done,  for 
Germany  was  the  strongest  power,  and  had  never 
touched  Ottoman  territory.  At  the  same  time 
they  organized  a  dictatorship  for  themselves  in 
the  Empire  under  the  semblance  of  constitutional 
government.  Dictator  of  Europe,  preponderant 
in  the  East,  every  day  more  populous,  more  opu- 
lent, and  more  pushing,  Germany  was  admired,  en- 
vied, and  feared  by  the  whole  world.  She  might 
well  have  been  content  and  proud.  Instead  of 
that,  she  was  afflicted  since  she  had  begun  to  defy 
Europe,  with  a  kind  of  irritability  recalling  her 
state  of  mind  between  1815  and  1866,  as  if  she 
had  gained  nothing  in  reaching  the  summit  of 
power  and  wealth  in  the  course  of  fifty  years. 
As  in  her  earlier  days,  she  was  obsessed  by  delu- 
sions of  persecution  and  accused  all  other  nations 
of  hating  and  threatening  her.  Now  as  before 
she  regarded  herself  as  ill-treated  and  humiliated 


The  German  Peace  233 

by  fate  because  she  did  not  possess  a  colonial 
empire  as  great  as  those  of  France  and  England. 
Now,  as  before,  and  even  more  than  ever,  being 
the  stronger,  she  vented  her  anger  at  imaginary 
wrongs  by  despising  all  nations  with  rancorous 
arrogance  and  more  especially  France.  Such  was 
the  inexorable  curse  of  a  Power  which,  relying 
on  numbers  and  on  quantity,  set  itself  no  limits 
and  for  which  every  goal  attained  was  merely  a 
point  of  departure  for  something  else !  Germany, 
however,  was  strong  enough  to  make  all  Eiu-ope 
suffer  for  her  malady,  and,  driven  on  by  the 
restlessness  in  the  mind  of  her  people  and  embold- 
ened by  the  weakness  of  her  adversaries,  the  Ger- 
man government  in  191 1  launched  the  third  and 
most  menacing  defiance — Agadir. 

Once  more  France  had  to  sweat  blood  in  order 
to  resist  threats  and  flatteries,  to  curb  her  most 
just  resentment  and  at  the  same  time  to  fight  the 
delusion  that  she  could  placate  the  enemy  by 
reconciliation.  The  Third  Republic  has  made 
many  mistakes,  but  Posterity  will  credit  it  with 
the  tremendous  merit  of  having  saved  Europe 
from  Germanism  by  its  perseverance  during  these 
years  of  passion  in  the  moderate  policy  of  never 
letting  itself  be  drawn  by  German  provocation 
into  assuming  before  the  world  responsibility  for  a 


234  Problems  of  Peace 

new  war,  of  yielding  to  the  utmost  possible  while 
never  going  so  far  as  the  reconciliation  for  which 
Germany  wished  and  which  would  have  made 
France  the  ally  of  her  former  enemy.  It  was  a 
difficult  and  thankless  poHcy,  exposed  to  all  the 
derision  of  malevolence  and  the  criticisms  of  the 
logician,  a  via  media  between  war  and  peace  which 
displeased  impatient  people  in  both  parties,  those 
who  did  not  recoil  from  the  dangers  of  war,  and 
those  who  wished  for  a  definitive  reconciliation. 
It  would  have  been  a  disaster  if  the  Republic 
had  yielded  to  the  arguments  or  the  reproaches 
of  either.  If  it  had  gone  to  war,  however  just 
its  quarrel,  it  would  have  been  abandoned  to  its 
powerful  enemy  by  the  distrust  and  malevolence  of 
which  it  was  still  the  object  all  over  the  world  at 
the  beginning  of  1914,  and  France  would  assuredly 
have  been  destroyed.  Forty  years  had  not  taught 
Europe  to  realize  that  France  was  the  keystone  of 
European  equilibrium  and  Europe  would  undoubt- 
edly have  left  her  to  perish,  only  to  repent  bitterly 
when  it  was  too  late.  On  the  other  hand  had 
France  allied  herself  with  Germany  in  the  mis- 
taken hope  of  placating  her  enemy,  she  would 
have  been  at  Germany's  mercy,  and  Germany 
would  at  once  have  become  mistress  of  Europe 
and  of  the  world,  because  the  coalition  against 


The  German  Peace  235 

which  German  ambitions  were  shattered  could 
never  have  been  formed  without  France.  What 
could  England  and  Russia  have  done  alone  ?  But 
if  France  saved  Europe  by  patient  waiting  and 
remembering,  the  patience,  the  waiting,  and  the 
remembering  were  never  so  difficult  as  they  were 
during  the  diplomatic  negotiations  which  took 
place  between  France  and  Germany  in  191 1  be- 
cause Germany  was  never  so  provocative  and  never 
so  full  of  blandishments.  On  this  occasion,  how- 
ever, Germany  again  did  not  dare  to  push  mat- 
ters to  extremities.  The  protracted  dispute  about 
Morocco  was  to  all  appearance  finally  settled  by  an 
agreement  under  which  Germany  gave  up  Moroc- 
co to  France  while  in  exchange  France  ceded  part 
of  the  Congo  to  Germany.  Although  the  agree- 
ment was  equally  displeasing  to  the  French  and 
to  the  German  public,  the  world  for  an  instant 
hoped  that  it  might  again  breathe  freely.  Quite 
suddenly  an  unexpected  development  of  events 
seemed  to  upset  the  situation  to  the  disadvan- 
tage of  Germany.  The  agreement  between  France 
and  Germany  and  the  protectorate  of  Morocco 
about  to  be  assumed  by  France  profoundly  dis- 
turbed Italy,  and  the  Government  was  obliged 
by  public  excitement  to  declare  war  on  Tur- 
key  in   September,    191 1,   in   order  to  re-estab- 


236  Problems  of  Peace 

lish  the  balance  of  power  in  the  Mediterranean, 
according  to  the  agreements  of  1902  by  the  con- 
quest of  Tripoli.     But  the  war  between  Italy  and 
Turkey,  which  lasted  over  a  year,  ended  by  stir- 
ring up   the  Balkans.     Serbia,  Montenegro,  Bul- 
garia, and  Greece  saw  that  the  hour  had  come  in 
which, by  uniting,  they  could  cut  the  Gordian  knot 
of  the  difficulties  in  Macedonia.     They  formed  an 
alliance  and  attacked  Turkey,  drove  the  Turks 
out  of  Macedonia  and  Thrace,  and  pursued  their 
defeated  armies  to  the  gates  of  Constantinople. 
Though  the  Central  Empires  succeeded  in  break- 
ing up  the  Balkan  League  by  inciting  Biilgaria 
against  her  allies  at   the  division  of  the  spoils, 
Germanism  seemed  by  the  middle  of  1 913  to  have 
suffered  disaster  in  the  East.     The  Turkish  Army, 
trained  and  armed  by  Germany,  had  been  anni- 
hilated by  four  Balkan  armies  which  nearly  all 
had   French    instruction    and    French   weapons. 
Austria-Hungary— and  with  Austria-Hungar}^  the 
whole  German  world — ceased  to  have  a  frontier 
with  Turkey.     Though  they  were  once  more  di- 
vided by  implacable  enmities,  the  Balkan  States 
were  interposed  as  a  barrier  between  Germany 
and  the  East,  and  of  these  Serbia,  the  enemy  of 
Austria,  had  been  almost  doubled  in  territory  and 
population.     Finally  the  victory  of  the  Serbian 


The  German  Peace  237 

arms  had  excited  the  Slav  populations  of  the 
Southern  provinces  of  the  empire,  and  had  awak- 
ened a  new  spirit  of  opposition  against  the  govern- 
ments of  Vienna  and  Budapest,  and  new  hopes 
and  illusions  of  a  happy  future. 

This  reversal  of  fortune  was  all  the  more  bitter 
because  the  enemies  of  Germany  could  enjoy  and 
exploit  it  without  having  moved  a  finger.  For  the 
defeat  which  had  overtaken  her,  Germany  had 
herself,  her  own  ambition,  her  own  audacity,  and 
her  own  strength  to  thank.  Public  opinion  was 
exasperated  by  what  appeared  to  be  a  new  injus- 
tice of  Fate  and  thereupon  the  German  Government 
took  an  irrevocable  decision  to  annihilate  Serbia 
at  the  cost  of  a  European  conflagration.  Founded 
on  force,  the  German  Empire  had  recourse  to  war 
as  to  the  judgment  of  God  which  would  prove  to 
a  doubting  Europe  that  she  possessed  legitimate 
title  to  domineer  over  all  the  peoples  of  the 
continent  who  were  either  too  old  or  too  young. 

For  the  fourth  time  the  plan  of  campaign, 
though  on  an  immeasurably  larger  scale,  was 
retraced  on  the  model  of  the  successful  wars  of 
1863,  1866,  and  1870.  As  in  1870  a  pretext  was 
sought  in  a  controversy  with  which  Germany 
could  say  she  had  nothing  to  do.  Then  it  was 
the  election  of  the  Eang  of  Spain ;  this  time  it  was 


238  Problems  of  Peace 

the  question  which  arose  between  Serbia  and 
Austria  on  the  subject  of  the  Sarajevo  murders. 
In  1870  when  the  French  Ambassador  at  Berhn 
sought  the  explanation  of  the  German  Govern- 
ment he  could  not  see  the  King,  who  was  at  a 
watering  place,  or  his  Prime  Minister,  who  was  in 
the  country,  but  only  high  officials  whose  answer 
was  that  the  matter  concerned  Spain  and  Prussia 
knew  nothing  about  it.  The  French  Government 
therefore  had  to  go  to  Madrid.  In  1914  the 
Emperor  was  in  northern  waters  when  i^ustria 
sent  her  outrageous  ultimatum  to  Serbia.  His 
ministers  replied  to  the  Entente  diplomatists  that 
they  knew  nothing  and  could  give  no  answer, 
that  the  matter  concerned  Austria,  and  they 
should  consult  Vienna.  As  in  1870  so  in  1914, 
there  were  the  same  tergiversations,  oscillations, 
and  ambiguities  intended  to  deceive  the  adversary, 
to  keep  him  in  suspense,  anxiously  hoping  for  an 
agreement,  to  prevent  him  from  resolutely  pre- 
paring for  war  while  Germany  made  her  final 
arrangements.  The  same  blandishments,  the 
same  tricks,  were  repeated  to  reassure  the  Powers 
which  might  intervene  and  to  prevent  a  coalition. 
And  in  1914  as  in  1870  no  sooner  were  her  armies 
ready  than  she  dropped  the  mask.  The  German 
Army  swooped  with  a  furious  onslaught  on  France, 


The  German  Peace  239 

so  as  to  terrify  Europe  and  by  producing  a  fait 
accompli  to  destroy  all  possible  combinations  be- 
fore they  could  be  formed. 

But  the  fourth  time  fortime  was  weary  of  be- 
ing tempted  by  the  same  devices.  The  surprise 
failed,  and  there  was  time  to  form  the  coalition. 
For  this  reason,  it  will  be  the  immortal  glory  of 
France  that  in  191 4  she  was  able  to  stop  the 
German  invasion  at  the  cost  of  her  best  blood. 
England  had  time  to  prepare  her  army.  Italy, 
Roumania,  and  Greece  had  time  to  intervene. 
The  United  States  had  time  to  bring  to  the  rescue 
of  Europe,  threatened  with  destruction  by  the 
defection  of  Russia,  the  last  reserves  of  civilization. 

Thus  the  world  was  saved,  but  at  what  a  price ! 
After  forty-four  years,  the  prediction,  which 
seemed  to  be  falsified  by  events,  that  the  German 
victories  of  1870  would  desolate  the  world  with 
terrible  wars  had  come  true.  Instead  of  being 
scattered  over  a  series  of  years,  these  wars  burst 
all  at  once  on  the  world  and  on  the  treasures  it 
had  accumulated  during  the  protracted  peace. 


CHAPTER  VII 

FROM  THE  HOLY  ALLIANCE  TO  THE  LEAGUE  OF 

NATIONS 

The  world  war  has  lasted  longer  than  the  most 
sombre  predictions  anticipated.  It  has  destroyed 
an  enormous  number  of  human  lives,  and  an  incal- 
culable sum  of  human  riches.  It  has  exhausted 
the  moral  and  economic  strength  of  all  the  States 
of  Europe,  those  of  the  victors  no  less  than 
those  of  the  vanquished.  Two  generations  will  per- 
haps be  needed  to  repair  the  ruin  wrought  in  the 
last  four  years.  In  compensation,  however, — pre- 
cisely because  it  has  lasted  so  long  and  destroyed 
so  much, — it  has  solved  the  problem  which  ever 
since  the  French  Revolution  has  tormented  Eu- 
rope. It  has  finally  settled  the  conflict  between 
Divine  Right  and  the  Sovereignty  of  the  People, 
between  the  dynastic  principle  and  the  principle 
of  nationality,  which  filled  the  whole  history  of  the 
nineteenth  century.  In  19 14  there  were  still  two 
Europes;  in    191 9  there  is  only  one.     With  the 

Russian  and  Austrian  Empires  fell  Divine  Right 

240 


To  the  League  of  Nations       241 

and  the  dynastic  principle  and  even  the  German 
Empire,  should  it  survive  the  crisis  through  which 
it  is  now  passing — as  seems  very  unlikely, — will 
not  by  itself  be  able  to  do  anything  to  restore 
that  vanished  worid.  The  principles  of  popular 
sovereignty  and  of  nationality  have  triumphed. 

The  victors,  therefore,  are  now  in  a  position  to 
solve  definitely  and  radically  all  the  questions 
which  have  distracted  Europe  for  a  hundred  years, 
even  those  which  five  years  ago  seemed  insoluble. 
They  have  a  free  field;  the  past  is  liquidated  and 
they  can  construct  de  novo  on  clear  and  precise 
principles  a  Europe  which  is  coherent  and  con- 
cordant with  itself.  The  opportunity  is  unique, 
immense,  almost  miraculous,  and  the  victors  will 
show  themselves  unworthy  of  their  victory  if  they 
let  it  pass  or  fail  to  make  proper  use  of  it.  Have 
we  not  seen  that  all  the  ills  of  Europe  have  arisen 
from  having  tried  for  a  whole  century  to  reconcile 
the  two  contending  principles  by  forced,  false,  and 
partial  solutions?  The  hour  of  expedients  is  past, 
and  the  hour  of  final,  because  coherent,  solutions 
has  come.  The  future  of  Europe  and  of  Western 
civilization  depends  on  the  energy  and  the  intelli- 
gence which  is  brought  to  bear  in  carrying  out  this 
duty. 

It  follows  that  now  is  the  moment  to  render 
16 


242  Problems  of  Peace 

justice  to  all  the  European  peoples  who  were 
victims  of  Germany,  of  Austria,  or  of  both, 
beginning  with  Italy,  Many  false  stories  have 
been  spread  throughout  the  world  about  Italy's 
share  in  the  war.  Beginning  with  the  so-caUed 
betrayal  of  her  old  allies,  her  calumniators  go  on 
to  say  that  she  was  contaminated  by  imperialistic 
ambitions,  and  full  of  crooked  plans.  The  reply 
to  all  these  charges  will  be  found  in  geography  and 
the  history  of  the  nineteenth  century  as  summar- 
ized in  this  book.  Look  on  the  map  at  the  coun- 
tries which  Italy  is  united  in  claiming  as  her 
reward  in  this  war — the  Trentino,  Trieste,  and 
Istria.  Part  of  the  nation  would  like  to  add 
Dalmatia  and  its  islands  and  a  protectorate  over 
Albania.  They  hope  that,  if  the  fall  of  the  Otto- 
man Empire  results  in  the  partition  of  Asia  Minor 
by  which  the  European  Powers  intend  to  profit  by 
establishing  Protectorates  or  by  any  of  the  other 
expedients  of  domination  familiar  to  the  old  diplo- 
macy, Italy  will  have  her  share.  But  the  Italian 
people  are  not  in  agreement  about  these  claims, 
because  influential  groups  maintain  that  the  na- 
tional, historical,  and  strategical  reasons  which 
justify  the  former  demands  do  not  cover  Dalmatia, 
and  they  are  very  reluctant  to  involve  Italy  too 
deeply  in  Eastern  affairs. 


To  the  League  of  Nations        243 

In  any  case,  even  if  Italian  ambitions  are  mea- 
sured by  the  larger  list,  they  should  be  compared 
with  the  sacrifices  she  has  undergone  and  the  risks 
she  has  run.  Though  Italy  has  not  lost  so  many 
men  in  the  war  as  France,  England,  Russia,  or  the 
enemy  empires,  she  has  yet  lost  a  very  large  num- 
ber— enough  to  leave  a  terrible  memory  of  this  war 
in  the  minds  of  several  generations.  Admitting, 
however,  that  the  number  of  Italian  lives  lost  is 
less,  let  it  be  remembered  that  none  of  the  allied 
countries  has  suffered  so  much  from  war  privations 
as  Italy,  or  has  more  seriously  compromised  the 
national  fortune  for  generations,  if  not  for  centu- 
ries. Italy  has  no  coal,  little  petroleum  and  iron. 
Italy  is  over-populated  because,  not^vithstanding 
the  fertility  of  her  soil  and  the  industry  of  her 
people,  she  cannot  produce  enough  to  feed  her 
people.  When  the  war  broke  out,  Italy,  though 
she  had  worked  hard  and  not  unsuccessfully  for 
thirty  years,  was  very  far  from  possessing  factories 
and  skilled  labour  sufficient  for  carrying  on  a  war 
which  made  so  much  use  of  machines.  The  war 
therefore  impoverished  Italy  to  a  greater  degree 
than  the  other  allied  countries;  it  deprived  her  of 
a  greater  nimiber  of  the  commodities  to  which 
everyone  had  become  accustomed  in  peace  time, 
and  imposed  on  her  a  greater  proportional  expen- 


244  Problems  of  Peace 

diture  of  labour  and  money  because  she  lacked 
almost  all  the  raw  materials  necessary  for  war 
industries.  All  things  considered,  the  war  will 
cost  her  not  less  than  fifty  milliards,  or  little  less 
than  half  the  estimated  national  fortune.  Add  the 
debt  which  the  nation  had  already  contracted  in 
order  to  make  itself  a  nation  and  the  continuing 
obligations  such  as  pensions  which  will  arise  out 
of  the  war,  and  it  will  be  seen  what  a  heavy 
burden  will  be  imposed  on  the  patrimony  of  the 
country. 

Nor  has  the  war  brought  Italy  any  of  the  com- 
pensations which  can  be  set  off  against  the  losses 
and  the  heavy  expenditure  incurred  by  France  and 
England.  England  received  a  high  price  foV 
freights,  for  coal  and  iron,  and  for  many  of  her 
manufactured  goods.  France  has  received  the 
fabulous  sums  expended  by  the  British  and  Ameri- 
can armies  on  the  continent.  Italy  on  the  other 
hand  was  deprived  by  the  war  of  all  her  richest 
sources  of  revenue.  Her  export  of  merchandise 
and  articles  of  luxury  was  suspended,  likewise  the 
tourist  traffic.  Moreover  it  should  not  be  for- 
gotten that,  in  the  thirty  years  which  preceded  the 
war,  Italy  had  traded  chiefly  with  the  Central 
Empires  from  which  she  obtained  most  of  the 
manufactured  articles  which  she  needed,  and  to 


To  the  League  of  Nations        245 

which  she  sold  the  greater  part  of  her  high-priced 
agricultural  products  of  which  she  had  abundance. 
By  helping  with  her  armies  to  destroy  the  Central 
Empires  Italy  has  deranged  the  whole  of  her 
foreign  trade. 

Let  us  now  place  in  the  other  scale  the  acquisi- 
tions she  hopes  to  make  in  compensation  for  these 
great  sacrifices.  The  territories  included  in  the 
list  put  forward  by  those  who  demand  the  most 
do  not  comprise  a  population  of  more  than  two 
millions,  leaving  out  of  account  Eastern  aspira- 
tions which  are  at  present  too  vague  to  reckon 
and  may  never  materialize  at  all.  Can  a  nation 
which  submitted  to  such  sacrifices  for  so  modest 
a  return  be  suspected  of  selfish  designs  and  im- 
moderate ambitions,  even  if  it  be  admitted  that  a 
section  of  public  opinion  is  mistaken  in  applying 
the  doctrine  of  nationality  to  a  part  of  these  small 
territories  ?  If  this  is  imperialism,  it  is  the  mad- 
dest that  has  ever  appeared  in  history.  No :  to 
suspect  Italy  of  imperialistic  ambition  is  to  insult 
her  century-old  misfortunes,  the  culmination  of 
which  came  in  the  supreme  sacrifice  which  she 
has  now  made.  The  history  of  these  misfortunes 
as  narrated  in  the  foregoing  pages  explains  what 
has  been  Italy's  position  in  the  world  war  and 
the  reason  for  that  sacrifice,  which  she  made  de- 


246  Problems  of  Peace 

liberately  when  she  decided  to  take  her  share  in 
the  conflict. 

For  ninety-nine  years  up  to  and  including  19 14 
(not  merely  until  1859  as  is  sometimes  supposed) 
Italy  had  been  the  victim  of  the  Congress  of  Vi- 
enna, or  rather  of  Europe  which  in  18 15  left  her 
divided  and  disarmed  in  the  power  of  Austria. 
The  readers  of  this  book  know  how  desperate  was 
the  state  to  which  the  Austrian  regime  reduced 
Italy,  how  impossible  it  was  for  her  either  to  live 
under  the  preposterous  governments  which  Aus- 
tria supported  or  to  reform  or  abolish  them,  what 
the  elite  of  the  people  who  were  the  eldest  child- 
ren of  European  culture  endured  for  nearly  half  a 
century,  seeing  themselves  reduced  to  be  miser- 
able serfs  of  a  German  Empire,  separated  from 
the  main  currents  of  Western  civilization,  buried 
alive  in  a  dead  past.  They  know  that  the  Revolu- 
tion of  1848,  after  raising  the  hope  that  her 
sufferings  were  nearly  over,  ended  in  a  disappoint- 
ment, and  that  the  war  of  1859,  owing  to  the  dis- 
trust, the  hesitation,  the  rivalries  and  the  scruples, 
not  always  disinterested,  of  Europe,  seemed  for  a 
moment  to  be  about  to  make  her  position  even  more 
impossible  than  before.  They  know  that,  in  order 
to  avoid  an  irreparable  catastrophe,  Italy  had  to 
use  violence  to  break  these  scruples  and  hesita- 


To  the  League  of  Nations       247 

tions,  and  how  she  did  so.  They  know  that  even 
the  wars  of  1859  and  i860  left  the  task  only  half 
finished,  and  that,  in  order  to  achieve  complete  in- 
dependence, Italy  was  forced  to  ally  herself  with 
Prussia  in  1866.  They  know  that,  with  the  war  of 
1866,  Germanism  took  a  decisive  step  towards  the 
hegemony  of  Europe,  but  that  owing  to  the  doubt- 
ful loyalty  of  Prussia,  the  timidity  of  Europe,  and 
some  errors  of  her  own,  Italy  was  not  even  then 
able  to  secure  her  own  natural  frontiers,  complete 
national  imity,  and  secure  boundaries.  They  know 
that  when  the  balance  of  power  in  Eiurope  was 
broken  by  the  war  of  1870,  Ital}^  could  not  by 
herself  resist  the  threats  of  Austria  and  maintain 
her  freedom  as  France,  an  older,  stronger,  and 
more  warlike  country,  succeeded  in  doing  against 
Prussia,  but  was  constrained  by  the  weakness  of 
her  frontiers  and  her  youthful  inexperience  to  ac- 
cept the  alliance  of  Austria  and  Germany.  They 
know,  finally,  that  this  alliance  for  thirty- two 
years  disguised  beneath  the  appearance  of  a  com- 
pact between  equals  a  final  remnant  of  the  old 
Austrian  domination  which  had  survived  the  war 
of  1866  and  was  neither  more  nor  less  than  a 
chain  which  bound  Italy  to  the  Central  Empires 
to  her  own  damage  and  that  of  Europe  and  to  the 
advantage  of  Germany  and  Austria. 


248  Problems  of  Peace 

By  arranging  the  affairs  of  Italy — as  was  done 
by  the  Congress  of  Vienna — and  by  constantly 
failing  to  solve  the  Italian  Question  which  it  had 
itself  raised,  Europe  caused  the  eldest  heir  of 
European  culture  to  waste  nearly  a  century  in  the 
misery  of  a  terrible  internal  crisis,  and  at  the  same 
time  dealt  itself  a  deadly  blow.  From  1815  to 
1 914,  the  Italian  Question  was  a  calamity  for 
all  the  States  of  Europe,  except  Germany  alone, 
for  whom  it  was  a  source  of  gain.  How  right 
Bismarck  was  when  he  said  to  Nigra  that  if  Italy 
did  not  exist  it  would  have  to  be  invented!  If 
Austria  was  the  torturer  of  Italy,  Italy  has  been 
the  ruin  of  Austria.  Because  she  wished  to  possess 
Italy,  Austria  ruined  Germany,  and  has  now  fallen 
herself.  The  Italian  Question  was  one  of  the 
causes  of  the  fall  of  the  second  Empire,  and  it 
would  be  difficult  to  enumerate  all  the  difficulties 
encountered  by  the  ])olicy  of  the  Third  Republic 
owing  to  the  adherence  of  Italy  to  the  Triple 
Alliance,  an  inevitable  consequence  of  leaving  un- 
solved a  residue  of  the  Italian  Question  in  the 
shape  of  the  unredeemed  territories. 

Italy  took  up  arms  in  191 5.  She  paid  the  terrible 
price  exacted  by  this  most  terrible  of  all  wars  to 
remove  this  remnant  and  to  gather  up  all  the  popu- 
lations which  arc  Italian  by  speech,  by  history, 


To  the  League  of  Nations        249 

and  by  culture  within  the  circle  of  her  strong 
natural  frontiers.  In  Italy,  as  all  over  the 
world,  the  majority  of  the  people  ardently  hope 
that  this  horrible  war  will  be  followed  by  an 
orderly  and  secure  peace  under  which  the  independ- 
ence of  peoples  will  be  protected  no  longer  by 
mountains,  rivers,  and  artillery,  but  by  respect  for 
right  and  justice.  No  one,  however,  can  foresee 
with  certainty  what  the  future  has  in  store,  and 
whether  or  not  Europe  will  succeed  in  staying 
the  hurricane  of  violence  which  has  broken  out. 
Two  opposite  conjectures  seem  reasonably  possi-. 
ble.  Every  page  of  history  teaches  us  that  vio- 
lence is  like  fire,  a  good  servant  but  a  bad  master. 
Occidental  civilization  has  evoked  violence  in 
every  shape  and  form  from  its  hiding  places  in 
matter  and  in  mind,  from  fire  throwers  and  poison 
gases  to  hatred  and  cruelty,  for  mutual  destruc- 
tion in  this  immense  conflict.  Will  these  forces 
obey  the  call  when  they  are  bidden  to  disband  their 
innimierable  legions  and  to  return  to  their  secret 
abodes?  Or  will  they  not  as  in  Russia  break  out 
into  a  hundred  wars  and  revolutions  and  fall  in 
separate  bands  on  the  slight  remnant  of  order  and 
peace  which  has  escaped  the  great  war?  No  one 
knows  or  can  tell  us. 

The  Italian  people,  therefore,  has  decided  that, 


250  Problems  of  Peace 

as  its  strongest  strategical  frontiers  coincide  in  the 
Alps  with  its  racial  linguistic  boundary,  to  com- 
plete its  national  unity,  and  at  the  same  time  to 
secure  its  full  independence  which  Europe  and 
misfortune  refused  until  19 14  to  concede.  This 
— no  more  and  no  less — is  the  meaning  of  the 
Italian  aspirations  to  the  possession  of  the  Tren- 
tino,  Trieste,  and  Istria.  By  reuniting  all  her  sons 
in  a  single  State,  Italy  v/ishes  to  make  herself 
safe  from  future  invasion  from  the  mountains  of 
which  that  of  the  autumn  of  191 7  must  be  the  last. 
She  refuses  to  be  threatened  by  a  German  power  in 
the  Adriatic,  which  should  be  a  Latin  and  a  Slav 
sea,  because  its  coasts  and  the  adjoining  territories 
are  inhabited  only  by  Slavs  and  Italians.  No  one 
denies  that  bands  of  Slovene  or  Croatian  shep- 
herds and  peasants,  often  called  in  by  the  Venetian 
Republic  or  other  possessors  of  the  soil,  pene- 
trated from  time  to  time  to  the  southern  slopes  of 
the  Alps,  where  they  have  established  i:)ermanent 
dwelling  places.  But  where  is  the  country  in 
which  there  is  not  some  slight  admixture  of  foreign 
races  and  foreign  languages  along  the  frontier? 
These  small  extraneous  groups  have  the  right  to 
demand  that  their  nationality  and  their  language 
shall  be  respected;  they  cannot  alter  the  national 
characteristics  of  a  region  which  is  fixed  by  the 


To  the  League  of  Nations        251 

majority  of  its  population,  by  its  history,  and  by 
its  traditions. 

By  the  time  this  book  is  published,  the  lands 
desired  by  Italy  will  have  passed  into  her  posses- 
sion by  force  of  arms,  but  Italy  does  not  wish  to  be 
suspected  of  confronting  Europe  and  America  with 
the  peremptory  argument  of  force.  She  wishes 
the  world  to  be  convinced  that  she  has  used  force 
in  the  service  of  her  right  to  secure  national  claims 
as  to  which  the  whole  nation  is  agreed.  The 
completion  of  national  unity  and  the  recovery  of 
natural  and  secure  frontiers,  however,  were  not  the 
only  reasons  for  the  war  which  Italy  has  waged  at 
the  cost  of  such  sacrifices.  Italy  took  arms  also 
to  prevent  the  Central  Empires  from  establishing 
a  brutal  and  tyrannical  domination  over  the  whole 
of  Europe.  Before  1914  no  impartial  observer 
could  have  found  any  trace  in  Italy  of  a  pro- 
found aversion  to  Germany.  There  was,  on  the 
contrary,  a  general  inclination  to  overlook  her 
defects  in  consideration  of  the  high  qualities  of 
which  she  was,  or  seemed  to  be,  an  example.  But 
when  Germany  took  the  initiative  in  starting  the 
conflagration,  when  she  violated  the  neutrality  of 
Belgium  and  upset  all  the  laws  of  war,  Italy's 
admiration  was  turned  to  horror.  The  country 
felt  that  it  was  better  to  sacrifice  what  little  riches 


252  Problems  of  Peace 

it  had  accumulated  in  half  a  century,  and  to  risk 
the  half  independence  won  with  so  much  toil 
than  to  stand  by  and  look  on  at  the  crime  which 
was  being  committed  against  good  faith  and  the 
rights  and  liberties  of  Europe.  Sympath}'-  for 
oppressed  Belgium,  for  France  and  England  who 
were  threatened,  were  no  less  potent  impulses  to 
intervention  than  the  national  claims.  Indeed 
it  is  quite  doubtful  whether  the  latter  motives 
would  have  been  enough  without  the  former  to 
induce  Italy  to  undertake  so  gigantic  and  so 
perilous  an  enterprise.  As  events  turned  out,  the 
sacrifice  we  made  was  not  in  vain.  Though  the 
effects  of  Italian  intervention  were  at  first  not 
much  felt  by  the  Allies  it  may  be  said  that  the 
forces  of  Italy  were  the  salvation  of  the  world  at 
the  most  terrible  crisis  of  the  war,  between  the 
collapse  of  the  Russian  front  and  the  arrival  of 
American  reinforcements  in  sufficient  numbers. 
Who  can  say  what  would  have  happened  if  Italy 
had  not  intervened,  and  if,  in  the  spring  of  1918  the 
Central  Empires  could  have  turned  against  the 
Western  Front  the  seven  hundred  thousand  Aus- 
trians  which  the  Italian  army  kept  pinned  down 
in  Italy?  This  is  a  point  which  should  never  be 
forgotten  by  any  one  who  wishes  to  judge  justly 
of  what  Italy  has  done. 


To  the  Leaorue  of  Nations        253 


Participation  in  the  world  war  is  the  last  of  the 
sacrifices  imposed  on  Ital^'-  by  European  policy 
since  181 5,  after  the  long  subjection  to  foreign 
rule,  after  the  grudging  and  imperfect  measure 
of  liberation  which  was  granted  to  her  and  the 
impositions  she  endured  for  half  a  centur}'  from 
the  German  Empires.  And  this  sacrifice  has  been 
so  great  that  it  does  not  seem  unreasonable  that, 
after  the  war,  in  addition  to  the  satisfaction  of  her 
national  aspirations  she  should  claim  from  her 
richer  Allies,  France,  England,  and  America  some 
help  in  rebuilding  her  shattered  fortunes.  In  pro- 
portion to  her  possessions  she  had  made  greater 
material  sacrifices.  At  the  end  of  the  v/ar,  she 
finds  all  her  trade  disorganized,  her  industries 
upset,  and  such  a  burden  of  public  debt  that 
many  are  asking  themselves  with  anxiety  how  the 
people  can  possibl}'  carr}'  it.  Her  allies  can  do 
much  to  help  her  to  conquer  this  difficulty  without 
internal  disturbances  if  they  will  regard  her  with 
intelligent  generosity,  not  forgetting  that  in  the 
war  Italy  did  all  that  her  strength  permitted  her 
to  do. 

With  Italy  the  greatest  victim  of  the  Germanic 
Empires  was  Poland.  How  hardly  Europe  has 
expiated  not  only  the  wrong  done  to  Italy  in  18 15 
but  also  the  indifference  with  which  the  partition 


254  Problems  of  Peace 

of  the  Polish  nations  was  regarded!  The  fall  of 
Poland  has  been  the  true  foundation  of  German 
greatness.  This  war  has  shown  that  a  vast  empire 
like  Russia,  populated  by  so  many  barbarous  races 
with  a  precarious  veneer  of  civilization,  devoured 
by  an  insatiable  hunger  for  territory,  involved  on 
so  many  fronts  in  Europe  and  Asia,  confused  by  a 
turbid  and  unequally  distributed  culture,  was  no 
barrier  to  Germanism,  but  in  fact  an  open  door  to 
the  East.  It  was  known  before  the  war  that  the 
Russian  Empire  was  becoming  Germanized  with 
extraordinary  rapidity  in  education,  in  adminis- 
tration, in  trade,  in  industry,  and  in  finance.  It 
is  now  clear  that  not  even  the  military  power  of 
Russia  could  be  relied  on  against  Germanism. 
The  Empire  of  the  Czar,  except  in  the  first  few 
months,  fought  weakly  without  energy,  without 
faith,  and  was  upset  in  the  midst  of  the  war  by  a 
Revolution  the  object  of  which  was  a  peace  which 
was  concluded  in  haste,  abandoning  the  Allies 
who  had  made  war  for  Russia's  sake.  To  curb 
German  expansion  towards  the  East  wc  require 
not  an  immense  half-empty  empire  like  Russia  but 
a  compact  well-populated  national  State  like  the 
other  national  States  of  Europe,  France,  Italy,  or 
Germany,  highly  civilized,  capable  of  industrial 
development,  with  a  dense  population  and  a  lim- 


To  the  League  of  Nations        255 

ited  territory.  This  State  can  be  no  other  than 
Poland. 

Analogous  considerations  apply  to  the  Austrian 
nation.  We  have  seen  that  the  power  of  German- 
ism rested  on  two  pillars,  the  German  Empire  and 
the  alliance  of  that  Empire  with  Austria-Hungary. 
The  dynasty  of  the  Hapsburgs  supported  by  the 
German  and  Magyar  aristocracies,  secured  to 
Germanism  the  forces  of  a  polyglot  empire  of 
fifty  millions  of  men,  all  the  advantages  of  geo- 
graphical position  and  a  broad  and  solid  bridge 
to  the  East.  The  day  on  which  Bohemia,  Hung- 
ary, and  the  Southern  Slavs  become  independent, 
the  day  on  which  the  Austro-Htmgarian  army 
ceases  to  be  a  State  within  a  State  connected  by 
bonds  of  personal  fidelity  to  the  Emperor,  will  see 
the  last  of  the  system  of  military  monarchy  and 
Divine  Right.  Germany  will  have  lost  half  her 
strength  apart  from  any  other  losses  she  may  suffer 
by  the  war. 

Another  necessary  reparation  is  the  restoration 
of  Alsace  and  Lorraine  to  France.  Alsace  and 
Lorraine  were  the  primary  reason  for  this  dreadful 
struggle  of  the  nations.  When  one  looks  at  them 
on  the  map  they  look  so  small  in  comparison  with 
the  world's  immensity,  that  it  seems  impossible 
that  they  can  have  generated  so  much  hatred 


256  Problems  of  Peace 

between  two  powerful  nations  and  disturbed  with 
such  terrible  consequences  the  peaceful  balance  of 
the  whole  earth.  But  whoever  knows  France  and 
French  history  understands  why  she  could  not 
forgive  or  forget  the  mortal  offence  inflicted  on  her 
by  Germany  when  she  was  deprived  of  these 
provinces  which  had  been  French  or  at  any  rate 
Gallicized  for  so  long.  France  is  an  equilibrium 
of  opposing  forces,  a  nation  neither  wholly  North- 
em  nor  wholly  Southern,  neither  wholly  industrial 
nor  wholly  agricultural,  neither  wholly  warlike 
nor  wholly  pacific.  Her  life  history  has  been  a 
reconciliation  after  terrible  struggles  of  these 
opposing  characteristics  of  climate,  race,  and  tend- 
ency. The  perennial  process  of  contradiction 
and  reconciliation  has  produced  both  her  strength 
and  her  weakness.  In  the  national  equilibrium 
Alsace  and  Lorraine  play  the  part  of  counterpoise 
to  Provence.  When  they  were  taken  from  her,  it 
was  not  merely  a  strip  of  territory  that  she  lost, 
but  a  vital  element  of  strength  and  completeness. 
There  is  another  reason  why  the  restoration  to 
France  of  these  two  provinces  will  help  to  re- 
establish the  world  balance  which  has  been  dis- 
turbed for  the  last  fifty  years.  They  are  rich  in 
coal  and  iron.  The  preponderance  acquired  by 
Germany  in  the  metal  trades  will  be  diminished 


To  the  League  of  Nations        257 

and  this  will  be  a  good  thing  for  everybody, 
because  there  is  no  doubt  that  the  prodigious, 
and  indeed  monstrous,  development  of  the  iron 
industry  was  one  of  the  strongest  stimulants  of 
German  arrogance  and  ambition,  and  one  of  the 
most  profound  causes  of  the  incessant  growth  of 
militarism. 

Nor  must  little  Schleswig  be  forgotten,  the 
victim  which  Bismarck  chose  in  order  to  put  to 
the  proof  the  courage  and  the  foresight  of  the  Great 
Powers  of  Europe.  The  Treaty  of  Prague  pro- 
vided that  the  inhabitants  of  Schleswig  could  not 
be  annexed  to  Prussia  without  their  own  consent, 
expressed  in  a  plebiscite.  That  plebiscite  has 
never  been  taken.  Europe,  freed  from  the  Ger- 
man danger,  must  compel  Prussia  to  keep  her 
promise  and  allow  the  Danes  of  Schleswig  to 
choose  freely  to  what  country  they  wish  to  belong. 

It  would,  however,  be  an  illusion  to  believe  that 
the  healing  of  these  old  wounds  inflicted  on  Justice 
and  Liberty  will  be  enough  to  secure  the  peace  of 
Europe.  The  convulsion  has  been  too  vast  for 
that.  Let  us  look  about  us.  The  Russian  Empire 
has  relapsed  into  a  condition  of  nebulous  incan- 
descence. The  Turkish  Empire  is  a  corpse  await- 
ing burial.  The  Austrian  Empire  has  fallen  into 
an  abyss  in  which  its  trampled  and  ill-used  peoples 
17 


258  Problems  of  Peace 

are  striving  to  fight  their  way  through  the  ruins 
of  the  ancient  order  towards  light  and  air.  The 
second  in  chronological  order  of  the  military 
empires  created  by  the  great  earthquake  of  the 
French  Revolution,  it  has  outlasted  all  the  others, 
having  endured  for  a  hundred  and  two  years. 
But  it  is  no  rash  conjecture  that  another  gulf  is 
about  to  open  and  swallow  the  last  and  the 
youngest  of  these  Empires — the  Empire  of  Ger- 
many. Who  can  believe  that  the  Germans  having 
laid  down  their  arms,  will  return  to  their  work- 
shops, their  warehouses,  their  lecture  rooms,  and 
take  up  their  labours  at  the  point  at  which  they 
left  off  on  the  first  day  of  August,  1914,  as  if 
nothing  had  happened  in  the  meantime?  The 
German  Empire  has  been  mortally  wounded  by 
its  defeat.  The  dark  forebodings  which  on  Jan- 
uary 18,  1871,  afflicted  the  old  King  of  Prussia 
when  his  companions  in  arms  offered  him  the 
Imperial  Crown  in  the  old  palace  of  the  Klings  of 
France  have  come  to  pass.  The  work  of  Bismarck 
is  about  to  be  destroyed.  It  was  the  work  of 
violence,  and  it  has  lasted  no  longer  than  all 
works  of  violence  which  deceive  mankind  by  their 
apparent  permanence  and  crumble  in  an  hour! 

Will  the  German   People  reconcile  themselves 
easily  to  the  fate  of  creeping  back,  hated  and  dis- 


To  the  League  of  Nations        259 

honoured,  into  European  Society  in  which  for 
so  many  years  they  played  the  part  of  proud 
and  tyrannical  leaders  of  Western  Civilization? 
Whatever  happens  the  dynasties,  the  aristocracy, 
and  the  bureaucracy  which  ruled  Germany  from 
1 87 1  till  1 9 14  have  been  discredited  both  at 
home  and  abroad,  and,  even  if  the  exhaustion 
of  the  people  allows  them  to  rule  Germany  for 
a  little  longer,  they  have  survived  themselves. 

The  crisis  which  to  all  appearance  it  will  be 
impossible  for  Germanism  to  escape  will  have 
effects  much  greater  than  those  of  the  Russian 
Revolution,  even  if,  as  is  probable,  it  does  not 
reach  such  heights  of  violence  and  folly.  Before 
the  war  the  German  Government  was  the  only 
government  in  Europe  which  did  not  tremble 
before  those  whom  it  was  its  duty  to  command, 
which  had  a  power  of  its  own  independent  of 
the  movement  of  public  opinion,  of  the  play  of 
rival  interests,  and  of  the  course  of  events.  Fur- 
ther, Germany,  in  spite  of  her  defects,  and  partly 
because  of  her  defects,  and  because  of  the  energy 
which  is  her  admitted  merit,  was  a  model  and  a 
stimulus  for  all  Europe,  even  if  her  influence  was 
by  no  means  always  good.  The  Entente  Govern- 
ments in  the  years  before  the  war  were  almost  all 
afflicted  by  the  phenomena  of  old  age,  red  tape. 


26o  Problems  of  Peace 

incoherence,  sluggishness,  weakness,  iincertainty, 
and  mediocrity  of  control.  This  evil  had  in  a 
greater  or  a  less  degree  attacked  all  their  organs, 
parliaments,  armies,  navies,  civil  service,  and 
universities  alike.  The  incessant,  noisy,  often 
charlatanesque  and  unscrupulous  activities  of  the 
German  Government  undoubtedly  had  a  stimu- 
lating effect  on  the  other  somewhat  weakened 
governments.  Now  that  the  model,  good  or  bad, 
is  discredited  and  partly  destroyed  by  the  crisis 
which  is  about  to  convulse  all  German  in- 
stitutions, the  stimulus  will  disappear  and  the 
psychological  equilibrium  of  Europe  will  be  pro- 
foundly disturbed  until  new  models  and  new 
stimuli  have  emerged  from  among  the  States 
which  used  to  imitate  Germany.  This  will  require 
both  time  and  hard  work. 

Furthermore  the  successors  of  the  Austro- 
Hungarian  Empire  will  be  a  certain  number  of 
new  National  States.  Every  lover  of  liberty  will 
be  delighted  to  greet  the  appearance  in  history  of 
these  new  democracies,  but  no  one  will  be  deceived 
by  the  expectation  that  they  can  be  bom  full 
grown.  The  apprenticeship  of  a  new  State  is 
always  arduous  and  tedious,  and  sometimes 
tempestuous,  and  these  States  are  coming  into  the 
world  in  circumstances  of  extreme  difficulty,  in 


To  the  League  of  Nations        261 

the  midst  of  a  Europe  devastated,  bled  white, 
convulsed,  and  impoverished  by  the  war.  Every- 
thing is  destroyed,  commercial  treaties  and  treaties 
of  alliance,  conventions  between  State  and  State 
relating  to  the  most  jealously  guarded  interests, 
the  public  and  private  law  of  every  single  State. 
The  elite  of  the  greater  European  nations,  and 
more  especially  its  youth  who  would  have  been 
called  to  govern  in  ten  or  fifteen  years'  time,  has 
been  mown  down.  The  Prussian,  no  less  than 
the  English  and  the  French,  aristocracy  has  been 
decimated.  The  sam.e  is  true  of  the  middle  class 
both  in  France  and  Germany.  The  better  part 
of  the  Russian  nation  is  dispersed  or  dead.  Every- 
where the  balance  of  wealth  has  been  upset;  vast 
fortunes  have  been  made  without  labour  by  ignor- 
ant, incapable,  or  cowardly  persons,  while  the 
flower  of  the  population  is  ruined  or  has  perished 
in  the  trenches.  The  national  fortune  even  of  the 
richest  peoples,  has  been  heavily  mortgaged  in 
order  to  meet  gigantic  war  obligations.  It  is  by 
no  means  rash  to  estimate  these  burdens  as 
amounting  to  more  than  half  of  their  total 
possessions.  Finally,  during  the  war  there  has 
been  revealed  to  all  eyes  the  double  soul — which 
wishes  for  power  and  at  the  same  time  for  justice 
— of  the  State  created  by  the  French  Revolution 


262  Problems  of  Peace 

and  by  the  nineteenth  century.  In  this  war  all 
the  most  generous  sentiments  which  make  life 
dear  to  men  have  been  exalted;  but  at  the  same 
time  the  most  terrible  offensive  weapons  which 
the  world  has  ever  seen  have  been  brought  into 
action.  The  States  of  Western  Civilization  finally 
have  dared  to  do  what  to  previous  ages  would 
have  seemed  madness  if  not  a  crime,  and  that  is, 
to  arm  the  masses. 

It  would  assuredly  be  ridiculous  presumption 
to  pretend  to  predict  what  is  likely  to  be  the  future 
of  the  world  or  to  indicate  to  Europe  the  way  to 
reconstruct  a  new  and  better  order  on  the  ruins  of 
the  old.  Yet  a  few  lessons  may  be  learned  and  a 
few  hints  taken  without  reckless  imprudence  from 
the  history  of  Europe  subsequent  to  the  French 
Revolution,  which  we  have  narrated  above. 
What  is  this  history  if  not  an  alternation  of 
periods  of  war  and  peace?  Until  1815  incessant 
war;  from  181 5  to  1848  a  long  peace;  from  1848- 
1870  a  new  tempest  of  war;  then  again  peace  till 
1 9 14.  These  long  intervals  of  tranquillity  prove 
that  the  peace  of  Europe  is  not  a  romantic  dream 
of  humanitarianism,  but  a  profound  need  of 
Western  Civilization  which  is  sometimes  over- 
borne by  other  forces  as  manifested  in  the  recur- 
rence of  protracted  spells  of  war.     What  are  these 


To  the  League  of  Nations        263 

forces?  The  popular  explanation  is  that  war  is 
constantly  due  to  the  ambition  of  Courts  and 
dynasties.  That  explanation  was  true  until  1815 
but  from  181 5  till  1848  it  was  precisely  the  dynas- 
ties which  imposed  peace  and  limited  the  develop- 
ment of  militarism  everywhere,  even  in  Prussia. 
Wars  and  competitive  armament  recommenced 
in  1848  just  when  the  liberal  bourgeoisie,  the  in- 
dustrials, the  professional,  and  intellectual  classes, 
the  sections  of  the  community  which  had  nothing 
to  do  with  the  military  art,  came  into  power  in  the 
State.  Even  the  final  and  most  frenzied  rivalry 
in  armaments,  which  began  after  1900,  and  which 
culminated  in  the  great  war,  covered  years  in  which 
democratic  doctrines  and  democratic  parties  were 
everywhere  gaining  ground.  Must  we  conclude 
that  the  responsibility  for  the  unlimited  armaments 
and  the  great  wars  of  the  nineteenth  and  twentieth 
centuries  lies  not  with  the  dynasties  and  the  Courts, 
but  with  the  middle  class  parties  and  the  dynasties  ? 
It  would  be  absurd. 

The  truth  lies  midway.  One  of  the  reasons 
why  Europe,  though  anxious  for  peace,  has  for 
more  than  a  century  been  unable  to  sleep  with- 
out being  fully  armed  and  with  her  sword  within 
reach  has  nothing  to  do  with  either  Courts  or 
democracies,  but  is  to  be  foimd  in  the  perennial 


264  Problems  of  Peace 

conflict  for  which  these  respectively  stand  in  this 
world.  For  more  than  a  century  Europe  has  been 
convulsed  by  a  dispute  which  no  argument  but 
only  force  can  settle — who  has  the  right  to  com- 
mand ?  Whom  is  it  the  duty  of  mankind  to  obey  ? 
Shall  they  obey  the  dynasties  who  pretend  to 
have  received  the  sacred  mission  from  God,  and 
the  classes  and  dignitaries  who  surround  and 
serve  them?  Or  shall  they  obey  the  Will  of  the 
People  as  expressed  by  all  the  organs  which 
Democracy  furnishes,  parliaments,  elections,  a  free 
press,  political  societies,  meetings,  and  so  on? 
Or  again  shall  they  obey  both  God  and  the 
People  associated  in  a  sort  of  mystical  and  demo- 
cratic oligarchy?  It  was  this  dispute  which 
kindled  the  wars  of  the  Revolution  and  the  Em- 
pire. The  banded  dynasties  of  Europe  would  not 
have  shown  so  much  eagerness  to  overthrow 
Napoleon  had  it  not  been  that  his  career  was  the 
negation  of  the  very  principle  on  which  their 
authority  had  rested  for  centuries.  The  conflict 
then  became  more  complicated  and  assumed  the 
double  aspect  of  a  fight  between  the  principle 
of  authority  and  the  principle  of  liberty  as  well  as 
between  the  dynastic  i)rinciple  and  the  principle 
of  nationality.  The  Holy  Alliance  united  the 
authoritarian    and    dynastic    principles    in    the 


To  the  League  of  Nations        265 

struggle  with  Liberalism  and  Nationalism,  and 
sought  by  this  alliance  to  overwhelm  the  two 
opposing  principles.  The  Revolution  of  1848 
broke  the  Holy  Alliance.  In  some  countries,  such 
as  France  and  Italy  and,  to  a  certain  extent,  even 
Germany,  the  dynastic  principle  came  to  terms 
with  Liberalism  and  Nationalism.  In  the  Austro- 
Hungarian  Empire  the  dynastic  principle  made 
some  concessions  to  Liberalism,  but  continued 
implacably  to  combat  Nationalism.  In  Russia 
the  dynasty  combated  both. 

At  bottom  all  the  wars  and  civil  wars  of  Europe 
in  the  nineteenth  century  reveal  this  conflict, 
even  the  world  war  on  which  Germany  decided  in 
order  to  save  the  dynastic  principle  in  the  Austrian 
Empire  which  was  threatened  by  Nationalism. 
This  conflict,  however,  as  always  happens  when 
two  principles  of  government  come  in  conflict, 
obscured  on  both  sides,  and  in  fact  throughout 
Europe,  the  sense  of  law  and  justice,  whether  in 
the  institutions  and  methods  of  government  or  in 
the  relations  between  one  State  and  another. 
Partisans  of  the  one  principle  or  the  other  have 
respected  or  claimed  respect  for  public  law  and 
justice  only  when  this  respect  could  be  used  as 
a  weapon  against  the  other  side.  When  either 
hoped  to  prevail  over  its  opponent,  it  was  ready  to 


266  Problems  of  Peace 

justify  coups  d'etat,  revolution,  violation  of  laws 
and  of  treaties,  and  indeed  any  violence  offered 
by  war  or  civil  war  to  the  principles  on  which  the 
internal  order  of  the  State  or  the  order  of  the 
commonwealth  of  nations  was  based. 

This,  I  repeat,  is  the  logical  explanation  of  all 
the  struggles  the  motive  of  which  is  the  right  to 
command.  The  ages  are  full  of  these  struggles, 
which  take  different  forms.  But  in  all  ages  when 
such  struggles  have  raged  the  human  conscience 
has  been  subject  to  the  same  eclipse  and  yet  the 
whole  world  was  never  rent  by  such  a  terrible 
cataclysm.  Why  is  it  that  this  eclipse  of  con- 
science now  seems  to  involve  not  merely  a  single 
State  or  potentate,  but  the  prosperity  and  the 
very  existence  of  the  whole  of  Western  Civili- 
zation? There  seem  to  be  two  reasons.  The 
first  is  that  the  nineteenth  century  took  such 
pleasure  in  the  eclipse  that  it  actually  made  a 
duty  and  a  glory  of  it !  How  disastrous  from  this 
point  of  view  was  the  career  of  Bismarck!  Few 
men  have  done  more  harm  than  he  to  Western 
Civilization.  His  audacity,  his  good  fortune,  the 
weakness  of  his  adversaries,  the  confusion  into 
which  his  insolent  triumph  threw  the  map  of 
Europe,  the  cowardice  with  which  in  the  end 
Europe   adored   this   success — all   this  perverted 


To  the  League  of  Nations        267 

civilization  and  prepared  the  most  savage  and 
ferocious  explosion  of  violence  which  history  has 
ever  seen. 

But  to  this  first  reason  the  second  must  be  added, 
which  is  the  appalling  strength  of  the  instruments 
of  destruction  which  Western  Civilization  has  at 
its  command.  All  the  older  civilizations  had 
observed  the  rule  of  the  extreme  limitation  of 
armaments,  according  to  which  the  military  forces 
and  the  mxilitary  expenditure  of  any  State  should 
be  as  small  as  possible  and  arms  the  monopoly  of 
a  very  small  minority  of  the  population.  After 
1870  Europe  upset  this  principle  and,  thanks  to 
conscription,  imposed  on  all  Continental  States  by 
the  French  Revolution,  thanks  to  the  develop- 
ment of  the  metal  industries  and  to  the  growth  of 
riches,  it  became  possible  to  apply  the  principle 
of  increasing  armaments  without  limit,  and  fi- 
nally to  create  the  monstrous  armies  of  millions 
which  for  four  years  have  been  massacring  each 
other  with  such  potent  and  deadly  weapons. 
Thus,  while  the  moral  limits  were  abolished  which 
the  principles  of  international  law  and  the  re- 
spect for  treaties  opposed  to  the  exercise  of  brute 
force,  the  material  limits  which  for  centuries  had 
been  set  to  the  means  of  such  violence  were 
greatly  widened.     What  wonder  that,  when  the 


268  Problems  of  Peace 

peaceful  fetters  which  bound  it  had  been  broken, 
violence  burst  forth  and  devastated  land  and  sea 
with  a  fury  of  which  History  had  previously  seen 
no  example? 

This  is  exactly  what  makes  it  a  question  of  life 
and  death  for  Western  Civilization,  that  these 
monstrous  forces  shall  be  restrained  so  that  they 
may  never  break  loose  again  with  such  homicidal 
madness.  Too  many  civilizations  have  perished 
because  they  did  not  know  how  to  check  in  time 
the  violence  which  had  been  let  loose  to  satisfy 
their  passions  or  to  defend  their  interests.  It  is 
clear,  therefore,  that  Europe  is  confronted  with 
the  same  task  which  the  Holy  Alliance  tried  to 
accomplish  at  the  end  of  the  wars  of  the  Revolu- 
tion and  the  Empire,  namely  to  clear  up  and 
reinvigorate  in  the  obscured  and  debilitated  con- 
science of  Europe  the  concept  of  the  respect  for 
legitimate  authority  in  the  internal  relations  of 
every  State,  and  the  concept  of  the  respect  for  the 
law  regulating  the  relations  of  one  State  to  another 
so  that  thereby  future  wars  and  revolutions  might 
be  prevented.  Though  the  principles  of  legiti- 
macy and  of  international  law  which  it  is  now 
expedient  to  establish  are  different  from  those  of 
the  Holy  Alliance,  the  means  to  be  used  must 
necessarily  be  the  same — a  League  of  Nations. 


To  the  League  of  Nations        269 

To  the  Holy  Alliance  which  was  a  league  of 
European  nations  formed  by  the  Courts  of  Europe 
there  must  succeed  an  Alliance  of  Peoples  who  are 
henceforth  masters  of  their  own  destinies. 

The  League  of  Nations  has  been  much  discussed 
during  these  years  of  war,  but  the  discussion  has 
been  rather  confused  and  a  great,  far  too  great, 
number  of  different  objects  have  been  laid  down 
for  it,  according  to  the  tendencies  of  its  different 
advocates.  A  league — even  a  league  of  peoples — 
which  tries  to  embrace  everything  is  in  danger  of 
accomplishing  nothing.  Can  we  in  the  light  of  the 
history  of  a  century  attempt  to  lay  down  precisely 
— at  all  events  in  principle — what  should  be  the 
chief  principles  of  a  league  of  the  peoples  of 
Europe  and  America  concluded  after  this  terrible 
war?  These  principles  appear  to  be  three  in 
number.  The  first  is  that  all  the  States  forming 
part  of  the  League  should  undertake  to  recognize 
and  to  deal  only  with  legally  constituted  govern- 
ments. Secondly,  they  should  pledge  themselves  to 
respect  nationality ;  that  is  to  say  the  language,  the 
religion,  and  the  culture  of  every  people.  Thirdly, 
they  should  undertake  to  reduce  armaments  to 
the  lowest  limits,  and  to  admit  the  principle  of 
reciprocal  inspection.  When  we  have  examined 
these  three  points  our  task  will  be  completed. 


270  Problems  of  Peace 

The  undertaking  not  to  recognize  and  not  to 
treat  with  any  but  lawful  governments  implies 
the  necessity  for  a  definition  of  legality  accepted 
by  all  the  contracting  parties.  What  should  this 
definition  be?  It  is  ver}^  clearly  indicated  by 
what  has  happened.  The  world  war  has  now 
annihilated  one  of  the  principles  of  authority 
which  ruled  Europe,  namely  Divine  Right.  Of 
the  three  Empires  which  represented  it  the  Rus- 
sian Empire  and  the  Austro-Hungarian  Empire 
are  already  destroyed.  The  Germanic  Empire  is 
tottering  and  will  either  fall  or  be  transformed. 
No  other  principle  remains,  therefore,  but  that  of 
the  Will  of  the  People  expressed  by  means  of  repre- 
sentative institutions.  Henceforth,  even  in  Eu- 
rope, all  parties  and  all  schools  of  thought  will 
be  compelled  to  recognize,  whether  they  like  it  or 
not,  that  popular  suffrage  and  representative  in- 
stitutions are  the  fount  of  lawful  authority,  for 
the  simple  fact  is  that  there  is  no  other.  But  the 
Will  of  the  People  is  a  principle  of  authority 
which  is  easily  falsified  and  adulterated  by  the 
army  or  the  violence  of  interests  and  factions, 
more  especially  in  Europe  where  after  1 848  it  was 
largely  used  as  an  instrumentum  regni  not  only 
by  Napoleon  III.  but  also  by  the  monarchies  of 
Divine  Right  such  as  Prussia  and  Austria.      Thus 


To  the  League  of  Nations        271 

the  principle  will  be  very  weak  and  the  tempta- 
tion to  falsify  it  by  fraud  or  violence  very  strong 
among  all  parties  after  the  war.  The  upper 
classes  and  the  conservative  parties  of  Europe 
are  not  prepared,  except  in  France  and  England, 
to  govern  by  means  of  this  formula  alone,  with- 
out the  support  of  traditions  derived  from  the 
formula  of  Divine  Right.  Therefore,  fearing 
that  Universal  Suffrage  may  get  beyond  their 
control,  they  may  repeat  the  well-known  man- 
oeuvre of  compromising  it  by  excesses  when 
they  fail  to  control  it  by  force  or  fraud.  The 
extreme  parties,  on  the  other  hand,  who  represent, 
or  say  they  represent,  the  masses,  will  have  much 
less  respect  for  the  law  than  they  had  before  the 
war,  because  they  will  feel  that  authority  is 
weakened,  and  therefore  that  it  is  easier  to  use 
force  or  fraud  when  they  succeed  in  dominating 
the  vague,  fluctuating,  and  mysterious  thing 
which  is  the  Will  of  the  People. 

In  order  to  prevent  the  States  of  Europe — and 
more  particularly  those  which  will  be  emerging 
from  the  ruins  of  the  Empires  of  Divine  Right — 
from  falling  into  anarchy,  the  League  of  Nations 
must  be  in  the  first  place  a  reciprocal  undertaking 
to  see  to  it  that  the  new  principle  of  authority 
is  loyally  maintained  by  all.     Any  State  which 


2']2  Problems  of  Peace 

abuses  the  principle  or  offers  violence  to  it  must 
be  excluded  from  the  League  and  become  liable 
to  all  the  penalties  reserved  for  States  which  rebel 
against  the  federal  agreement.  The  importance 
of  this  principle  is  confirmed  by  a  curious  but 
most  manifest  proof  and  one  which  offers  a  very 
sound  criterion  by  which  the  affairs  of  Russia 
may  be  judged.  What  is  Europe  to  do  with  this 
immense  chaos  which  extends  from  the  Baltic 
to  the  Yellow  Sea  ?  It  is  visionary  to  pretend  that 
the  Belligerent  Powers  can  set  it  in  order  at  the 
Peace  Conference.  From  a  nebula  there  cannot 
be  re-formed  one  or  more  planetary  systems  each 
with  its  sun,  its  planets  and  their  satellites,  with- 
out an  effort  from  within.  But  at  any  rate, 
Europe  can  hasten  the  process  of  resolution  by 
declaring  that  it  will  not  recognize  and  will  not 
treat  with  any  but  a  legal  government. 

When  the  Russian  Revolution  broke  out  it  was 
at  once  compared  with  the  French  Revolution. 
This  was  an  error,  because  the  Russian  Revolu- 
tion resembled  not  the  French  Revolution  of  1789 
but  the  Paris  Revolution  of  1848.  Like  the  latter 
it  began  with  an  abdication  which  was  intended 
to  preserve  the  power  of  the  reigning  family,  but 
was  carried  out  too  late  and  was  overwhelmed  by 
the    revolutionary    and     republican    movement 


To  the  League  of  Nations        273 

which  upset  the  dynasty  and  entrusted  the  State 
to  a  Provisional  Government.  In  France,  as  in 
Russia,  the  Provisional  Government  proposed  to 
summon  an  assembly  elected  by  Universal  Suf- 
frage to  arrange  the  new  State.  But  in  France, 
as  in  Russia,  the  extreme  parties,  particularly  the 
Socialists,  at  once  began  to  accuse  the  Provisional 
Government  of  betraying  the  Republic,  and  to 
demand  social  reforms  which  upset  the  balance 
of  Society.  Finally,  in  France,  as  in  Russia, 
these  factions  rose  in  armed  rebellion  against 
Universal  Suffrage.  At  this  point  the  difference 
begins.  While  in  Paris  the  revolt  against 
Universal  Suffrage  was  overcome  during  the 
fighting  of  June,  the  Maximalist  movement  was 
victorious  at  Petrograd.  This  is  the  very  reason 
why  the  Allies  who  have  vanquished  the  Central 
Empires  should  declare  that  they  will  recognize 
no  Russian  Government  which  is  not  formed  by 
a  Constituent  Assembly  debating  after  being 
regularly  elected  and  convoked.  The  faction 
which  now  rules  over  part  of  Russia  has  intruded 
itself  into  power  by  acts  of  violence,  and  therefore 
has  no  title  to  authority  but  force.  Europe  can- 
not recognize  it. 

This    principle    also    raises    the    tremendous 

question  whether,  and  if  so  when,  a  more  powerful 
18 


2/4  Problems  of  Peace 

State  has  the  right  to  control  the  affairs  of  an- 
other and  a  weaker  State — the  so-called  rights  of 
civilization  over  savages.  In  the  circle  of  Euro- 
pean and  American  civilization,  comprising  all 
the  States  which  have  accepted  the  Will  of  the 
People  expressed  through  representative  institu- 
tions as  the  foimt  of  authority,  and  which  will 
therefore  form  part  of  the  League  of  Nations, 
incapacity  to  work  representative  institutions 
peacefully  will  be  the  only  justification  for  foreign 
intervention,  single  or  collective.  Among  peoples 
which  use  different  principles  of  authority,  the 
question  is  more  difficult.  It  is  enough  for  the 
moment  to  forecast  that,  if  forcible  interven- 
tion in  such  cases  does  become  necessary,  its 
motives  will  be  higher  than  the  old  idea  of  etwas 
erwerben. 

The  second  principle  which  the  League  of 
Nations  must  regard  as  a  cornerstone  of  the  new 
European  edifice,  is  the  principle  of  nationality, 
or,  in  other  words,  the  right  of  a  people  to  be 
governed  by  men  of  its  own  race,  language,  cul- 
ture, and  religion,  and,  when  this  is  impossible, 
the  right  to  have  its  language,  culture,  and  re- 
ligion respected,  however  different  these  may  be 
from  those  of  the  majority,  and  not  to  be  com- 
pelled to  change  them  against  its  will.     Nations 


To  the  League  of  Nations       275 

desire  peace  or  war  not  merely  because  they  are 
naturally  pacific  or  warlike,  but  according  to  the 
spirit  which  moves  them  and  the  interests  or 
passions  which  prevail  at  a  given  moment.  The 
fall  of  two  Empires  like  Russia  and  Austria- 
Hungary  under  which  so  many  nations  lived 
together  in  the  bonds  of  fidelity  to  a  single  dy- 
nasty may  well  multiply  and  not  diminish  occa- 
sions of  war  if  the  national  States  which  will  take 
the  place  of  these  Empires  begin  to  quarrel 
bitterly  over  the  delimitation  of  their  frontiers, 
for  the  possession  of  a  river  or  a  range  of  mount- 
ains, a  mineral  region  or  a  position  of  strategical 
value.  The  boundaries  of  language  and  nation- 
ality are  never  very  clear,  and  how  many  are 
the  interests  which  may  confuse  and  embitter 
national  conflicts  in  these  debatable  lands! 
Without  some  superior  authority  to  check  and 
regulate  these  conflicts  with  justice  the  reconstitu- 
tion  of  Europe  in  accordance  with  the  principle 
of  Nationality  might  create  all  over  the  continent 
a  large  number  of  little  Alsace-Lorraines.  The 
questions  which  have  already  arisen  between 
Poland  and  the  Ukraine  on  the  subject  of  their 
future  boundaries,  before  even  the  States  them- 
selves have  come  into  being,  may  give  some  idea 
of  the  danger  and  the  difficulty.      Nor  is  it  possi- 


276  Problems  of  Peace 

ble  that  all  men  speaking  the  same  language 
shall  be  placed  under  their  national  government, 
for  there  will  always  be  small  and  dispersed 
nuclei  for  ever  completely  enclosed  in  foreign 
territory.  Even  after  Europe  has  been  reorgan- 
ized on  the  basis  of  the  principle  of  nationality 
there  will  be  Slavs  in  Italian  territory,  and 
Italians  and  Germans  in  Slav  territory.  What 
wars  may  not  germinate  from  these  exceptions  to 
the  principle  of  nationality  if  they  are  not  tem- 
pered by  a  scrupulous  respect  for  all  the  rights  of 
national  minorities! 

It  is,  in  fact,  necessary  to  lay  down  respect  for 
nationality  as  a  fundamental  principle  of  public 
law,  and  consequently  to  forbid  any  violence  to 
this  principle  involving  the  dismemberment  of 
a  nation  on  any  ground  whatsoever,  whether 
strategic,  economic,  or  political.  The  principle 
must  be  regarded  as  overriding  every  interest. 
Moreover  the  policy  of  forced  denationalization — 
also  a  German  invention — must  be  rigidly  pro- 
scribed as  an  act  of  illegal  warfare.  It  is  only  by 
the  resolute  and  coherent  application  of  these  two 
propositions  that  it  will  be  possible  to  find  any 
way  out  of  the  inextricable  tangle  of  the  Balkan 
problem.  In  the  Balkan  peninsula  nationalities 
are  so  involved  with  each  other  that  it  is  difficult" 


To  the  League  of  Nations       277 

to  say  whether  some  lands  are  Bulgarian,  Serb- 
ian, Albanian,  or  Greek.  This  is  the  case  in 
Macedonia.  If  force  is  applied  to  the  problem, 
we  cannot  expect  any  solution  until,  after  a 
century  of  warfare,  all  the  combatants  have 
perished  and  the  country  in  dispute  has  been 
destroyed.  Only  a  reasonable  and  just  agree- 
ment, firmly  and  coherently  applied  to  the  four 
Balkan  peoples,  can  cut  the  knot  without  pro- 
ducing new  catastrophes.  We  must  review  the 
Treaty  of  Bucharest,  which  was  imposed  by  the 
sword,  and  recognize  Bulgaria's  rights  in  Mace- 
donia so  far  as  they  are  just.  We  must  not  take 
the  opportunity  offered  by  the  rearrangement 
of  the  peninsula  to  inflict  punishment,  however 
well  merited.  We  must  insist  on  the  four  Balkan 
peoples  forming  a  federation  with  mutual  obli- 
gations not  to  offer  violence  to  populations  of 
different  nationalities,  and  we  must  take  care 
that  they  are  sparingly  supplied  with  arms.  The 
revision  of  the  Treaty  of  Bucharest  should  be 
easy  now  that  Serbia  and  Greece  are  to  be  in- 
creased by  so  much  new  territory  that  is  entirely 
Serbian  and  Greek.  Thus,  little  by  little,  the 
small  foreign  groups  which  remain  in  every  State 
will  become  spontaneously  denationalized  and 
the  Balkan  Peninsula,  the  focus  of  so  many  wars, 


278  Problems  of  Peace 

will  be  pacified  under  the  care  and  guidance  of 
the  League  of  Nations. 

There  remains  the  third  and  last  principle,  the 
limitation  of  armaments.  I  have  said  limitation 
of  armaments,  and  not  disarmament  as  many  do ; 
because  the  word  disarmament  is  either  improp- 
erly used  to  mean  limitation  of  armaments  or 
implies  an  error  of  substance.  No  European 
State,  and  no  State  in  this  world,  can  entirely 
•  disarm,  because  force  is,  to  a  certain  extent,  a 
necessary  element  in  its  life,  good  order,  and  well- 
being.  But  no  State  is  obliged  to  develop  its 
force  to  the  utmost  at  the  risk  of  perishing  from 
a  congestion  of  energy.  Very  powerful  States 
and  flourishing  civilizations  have  been  able  to 
subsist  with  limited  military  forces.  Why  should 
not  the  States  of  Europe  and  Western  Civili- 
zation continue  to  flourish  in  the  same  way? 
It  is  difficult  to  predict  whether  the  war  which 
is  now  drawing  to  a  close  is  indeed  to  be  the  last 
of  all  wars.  It  certainly  must  be  if  Western 
Civilization  is  not  to  be  destroyed  utterly.  In 
order  that  it  shall  be  the  last,  we  must  limit  the 
instruments  of  destruction  which  have  grown 
too  much  in  number  and  in  power.  This^  as 
many  think,  is  not  beyond  the  wit  of  man  to 
accomplish;  it  is  possible,  and  even  easy,  if  the 


To  the  League  of  Nations        279 

peoples  of  Europe  and  America  firmly  and  sin- 
cerely wish  it. 

The  century  of  history  which  we  have  narrated 
shows  clearly  what  are  the  three  most  effective 
means  of  limiting  armaments.  The  first  is  the 
registration  of  all  armament  factories.  Has  not 
the  monstrous  development  of  European  mili- 
tarism been  due,  at  any  rate  in  part,  to  the  free 
range  of  industry  which,  excited  by  a  passion  for 
enormous  gains,  has  multiplied  inventions  of  new 
and  powerful  instruments  of  war.  The  second 
remedy,  which  is  still  more  drastic,  is  the  uni- 
versal abolition  of  conscription  and  a  return 
to  professional  armies.  Conscription  alone — the 
expedient  for  increasing  numbers — has  made 
possible  the  creation  of  the  overgrown  armies 
which  have  fought  this  interminable  and  most 
murderous  war.  The  day  on  which  governments 
w411  be  able  to  rely  only  on  voluntary  enlistments 
will  again — and  for  obvious  reasons — see  the 
reduction  of  armies  to  modest  proportions. 
Europe  will  also  have  the  advantage  of  being 
able  to  revive  and  preserve  in  these  small  armies 
the  true  and  sane  principles  of  the  art  of  war 
instead  of  the  monstrous  falsification  of  them 
which  the  German  victories  of  1866  and  1870 
foisted  on  the  world.     The  third  and  last  remedy 


28o  Problems  of  Peace 

is  mutual  inspection  and  control  of  armaments. 
A  League  of  Nations  will  be  senseless  if  it  does 
not  accept  the  principle  that  the  number,  the 
organization,  and  the  purpose  of  military  forces 
are  not  matters  of  which  each  State,  as  part  of  its 
sovereignty,  is  to  be  the  absolute  judge,  but 
questions  of  common  interest  to  the  League  of 
which  they  form  part. 

Are  these  ideas  and  proposals  dreams  which 
will  perish  in  the  coming  whirlwind  of  events? 
Or  do  they  contain  some  possibilities  of  trans- 
formation which  will  become  the  actualities  of 
tomorrow?  We  shall  see.  But  if  anyone  says 
that  such  an  order  of  things  has  never  been  and 
consequently  can  never  be  again,  the  answer  is 
that  on  the  contrary  Europe  has  known  an 
example,  though  on  a  smaller  scale,  of  reciprocal 
control  among  a  body  of  States,  minutely  organ- 
ized to  maintain  peace  and  internal  order.  This 
was  the  Germanic  Confederation  set  up  in  1815 
by  the  Congress  of  Vienna  which  Bismarck,  the 
evil  genius  of  the  new  Europe,  hated  and  de- 
stroyed in  1866.  Will  Europe  as  a  whole  after 
such  a  terrible  experience,  when  it  is  a  question 
of  saving  Western  Civilization  from  a  disaster 
the  consequences  of  which  may  last  for  centuries, 
fail  to  achieve  what  the  Germans  did  before  they 


To  the  League  of  Nations        281 

were  tempted  by  the  Devil  and  sold  their  souls? 
However  this  may  be,  the  Americans,  who  have 
already  saved  Europe  from  German  domination 
by  intervening  when  Russia  abandoned  the 
common  cause,  can  do  much  to  help  Europe  to 
save  itself  from  the  dangers  which  await  it  by 
using  all  the  authority  America  so  justly  enjoys 
to  encourage  and  impel  the  old  continent  to 
follow  this  path  resolutely.  They  will  by  so 
doing  render  a  great  service  to  Europe,  and  to 
America  as  well.  Western  Civilization  is  a 
grandiose  Gothic  vault,  soaring  sublime  towards 
the  sky.  One  of  its  arches  is  Europe,  the  other 
America.  If  either  arch  is  broken,  the  other  will 
be  endangered. 


The  Chaos  in  Europe 

By 

Frederick  Moore 

Author  of  "  The  Balkan  Trail,"  "  The  Passing  of  Morocco,"  etc. 
With  an  Introduction  by 

Charles  W.  Eliot,  LL.D. 

President  Emeritus,  Harvard  University 

/2''.     Folding  Map  in  Color.     $l.50  net 
By  mail,  $1.65 

A  Consideration  of  the  Political  De- 
struction that  has  taken  place  in  Russia 
and  Elsewhere  and  of  the  International 
Policies  of  America. 

The  author  has  had  a  rare  experience 
as  a  correspondent,  qualifying  him  to 
a  remarkable  degree  to  describe  the 
present  military  and  political  situation. 
His  suggestions  referring  to  the  future 
foreign  policy  of  the  United  States 
merit  the  careful  attention  of  leaders 
of  opinion. 


G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 

New  York  London 


The  World  War 

And  Its  Consequences 

By 

William  Herbert  Hobbs 

With  an  Introduction  by 

Theodore  Roosevelt 

Cr.  8°.     $2.SO  net.     By  mail,  $2.70 

Theodore  Roosevelt  said,  after  a 
careful  reading  of  the  Manuscript:  **It 
is  the  literal  truth,  that  if  I  could  choose 
only  one  book  to  be  put  in  the  hand  of 
every  man  and  woman  in  the  United 
States,  I  would  choose  the  book  of 
Professor  Hobbs." 

G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 

New  York  London 


The  Vandal  of  Europe 

By   Wilheim   Miihlon 


J2°.     $1.30  net.     By  mail,  $1.65 


Herr  Miihlon,  formerly  one  of  the  important 
directors  of  the  great  Krupp  works,  and  inti- 
mately connected  with  the  ruling  group  of  the 
German  Empire,  is  now  an  exile.  Why  ?  Be- 
cause he  became  sickened  by  the  ruthless  am- 
bition and  barbarous  methods  of  the  military 
caste  that  plunged  the  world  into  the  present 
terrible  warfare. 

This  book  is  MUhlon's  diary,  kept  during  the 
first  few  months  of  the  war,  when  he  was  still  a 
director  of  Krupp's. 

On  August  30,  1914,  he  wrote :  "  It  is  only  to- 
day that  I  have  at  last  learned  to  know  my  com- 
patriots." A  few  days  later:  "The  German 
press  is  a  shameful  liar."  On  November  loth: 
"  I  have  received  authentic  information  from  the 
front  that  the  Kaiser  declared  before  an  as- 
sembly of  officers  that  Germany  had  enough 
prisoners,  and  that  henceforth  no  more  prison- 
ers must  be  taken  alive."  This  all-important 
volume  merits  world-wide  circulation. 


G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 

New  York  London 


The 
Guilt  of  Germany 

For  the  War  of  German  Aggression 

By 

Prince  Karl  Lichnowsky 

Preface  by 
Viscount  Bryce 

12°.     Price,   75c,  net     By  mail,  85c, 

This  volume  contains  Prince  Lich- 
nowsky's  famous  "  memorandiun "  in 
which  he  fastens  the  guilt  for  propagat- 
ing the  world  war,  on  Germany — im- 
hesitatingly  proclaims  it  the  war  of 
German  Aggression.  The  author  was 
German  Ambassador  to  England  before 
hostilities  broke  out,  and  he  upholds 
England  as  blameless,  and  hails  Earl 
Grey  as  an  apostle  of  Peace.  Von 
Jagow's  reply  to  the  "  memorandum  "  is 
included. 

G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 

New  York  London 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 

Los  Angeles 
This  book  is  DUE  on  the  last  date  stamped  below. 


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